Out-of-town bus service may be cut at end of March

Jeff Helsdon, Editor

If nothing changes, Tillsonburg’s out-of-town bus service will be cut due to an end of provincial funding.

T:Go’s inter-community transit is funded by a provincial grant, and operated by the town. It’s set up in four routes and connects to Port Burwell, Langton, Delhi, Ingersoll, Woodstock, Norwich and London. Provincial funding will end on March 31, and the operation of the system could end with it if nothing else changes.

The inter-community transit system had 10,384 riders between August 2020 and December 2024. About 70 per cent of the ridership was on Route 1, which goes Monday to Friday and joins rural Oxford communities with Tillsonburg, Ingersoll and Woodstock. By comparison, T:Go ridership in town was 44,397 between January 2021 and December 2024.

The system was originally set up through SCOR, which is an economic alliance of southern Ontario municipalities. When it was set up, Tillsonburg was paid to operate the system. While it seems there is a disconnect between transit and economic development, SCOR executive director Kimberly Earls explained there was a need for affordable transit for workers.

“One thing that came up in employer surveys was they had a hard time recruiting and retaining workers due to limited transit options,” she said.

The transit system was funded through the Community Transit Grant Program. This program was replaced by the Ontario Transit Investment Fund last fall.

“Unlike the CT grant, individual municipalities cannot apply,” said Chris Baird, Tillsonburg’s acting director of operations and development. “Only project teams can apply involving all lower-tier municipalities. Without the buy-in of our county neighbours, a successful OTIF application is non-viable.”

“The town has reached out to other municipalities who are part of it, but there has been no uptake,” said Tillsonburg Mayor Deb Gilvesy.

Tillsonburg also talked to Norfolk County officials, but the conclusion was the same that support was needed from Oxford municipalities.

In the background are complications within Oxford County. The county proposed a north Oxford transit system last fall. Woodstock and Ingersoll launched a court challenge to try to block the decision, maintaining that transit is a lower-tier responsibility and the county shouldn’t be involved.

Baird said a discussion with county senior management took place in November 2024.

“We proposed a county-wide levy to each lower-tier municipality,” he said of the discussions. “However, with the potential legal battle over transit, Oxford County wasn't comfortable moving forward. Furthermore, Oxford County alluded to conducting a study of the proposed routes to make sure it's a right fit transit solution — with a study, we'd come back to the table and hopefully by then their legal battle would be over.”

An application was made by Tillsonburg to a fund to assist with costs of the study.

Outside Tillsonburg, East Zorra-Tavistock and Perth County also made recent decisions to end their rural transit services.