--- title: "Ottawa auditor finds OC Transpo buses ran late 37% of mornings in January 2026 as scheduling falls behind traffic" description: "Ottawa's auditor general found OC Transpo's bus schedules are based on 2023 data that no longer reflects road conditions, leaving 29% of weekday routes with run times that varied by 10% or more from actual travel times." canonical_url: "https://voche.me/on/ottawa-2026/news/oc-transpo-bus-service-planning-audit-2026" last_updated: "2026-11-13T20:50:29.420Z" --- Ottawa's auditor general found that OC Transpo's bus schedules are built on traffic data from 2023 that no longer reflects current road conditions, that buses had enough vehicles to deliver peak afternoon service on only 29 of 62 weekdays from January to March 2026, and that the formal standards used to plan the transit network have not been updated since 2005. The Audit of Bus Service Planning and Scheduling, released by Auditor General Nathalie Gougeon in June 2026, examined how OC Transpo plans its bus routes and schedules. OC Transpo's 2026 bus operations budget is $419 million, part of a total $905 million transit budget for the year. ## Run times no longer reflect the roads Each bus trip is assigned a scheduled run time, set at the 85th percentile of actual trip times so that most buses will finish on time. OC Transpo last updated its run times for the launch of New Ways to Bus on April 27, 2025, using data collected in 2023. The audit found that because the launch was delayed, those run times became inaccurate as traffic conditions across Ottawa changed. For weekday routes of 30 minutes or more, 29% had run times that varied by 10% or more from actual travel times as of the fall 2025 service booking, the audit found. Of those routes with large gaps, 86% had too little scheduled time and 14% had too much. By the spring 2026 service booking, run time adjustments had been made for seven routes, but 35 routes still had run times off by more than 10%. The scheduling gaps showed up in performance. During afternoon peak periods from August to November 2025, routes started late on 19% of trips. In January 2026, start times were late 37% of the time, with 24% of trips starting more than 10 minutes late. For the 25 frequent routes tracked for regularity, 5 (20%) met the 85% target on average from September 2025 to the end of January 2026 weekday service. For the 78 non-frequent, non-school routes, 3 (4%) met the punctuality target. None of the 73 school routes met the target. ## Not enough buses or operators The base scheduled number of buses required to deliver peak afternoon service under New Ways to Bus was 540, the audit found. Bus shortages led to a decision to cut that to 524 for the spring 2025 booking. In January 2026, OC Transpo reduced the requirement to 500 and removed additional trips from the schedule. Even after those reductions, OC Transpo met its peak afternoon bus requirement on only 29 of 62 weekdays from January to March 2026, the audit found. For January and February 2026, the bus fleet was 67% available on average each day. The audit notes that a healthy fleet typically has 80% of its vehicles available. The Toronto Transit Commission has maintained bus availability averaging 110% for several years. Operator shortages compounded the problem. The audit found that from January 4 to March 1, 2026, 28% of trip cancellations were attributed to operator availability. Based on OC Transpo's own projections, the operator shortage is not expected to be resolved until January 2027. ## Service standards from 2005 OC Transpo's formal service planning standards were last updated in 2005. The two documents that set those standards, the Transit Service and Fare Policy Manual and the Transit System Management Policies, are no longer publicly accessible, the audit found. Management told auditors that the coverage target from those standards, requiring 95% of residents in the base route network to live within 800 metres of all-day service, was already not being met when last analyzed in 2014 and was likely never achievable. The 2005 standards also set a target for 55% of operating costs to be covered by fares; the figure used in the 2026 budget was 33%, the audit found. The audit found that New Ways to Bus was designed to reduce annual bus operating costs by $10 million, equal to 70,000 service hours a year. Because service standards had not been updated, the redesign lacked a current framework to assess trade-offs. No formal post-implementation review has been conducted or planned. ## Nine recommendations, all accepted Management agreed with all 9 recommendations. The most immediate step is building a more conservative buffer of buses and operators into service planning, estimated for completion in Q3 2026. The audit also calls for a systematic method to update and monitor run times (Q1 2027), deadhead travel time updates (Q2 2027), recovery time rebalancing (Q3 2027), a revised long-term bus fleet plan including spare ratios for each vehicle type (Q2 2027), and updated and consolidated service standards with a mandatory 10-year review cycle (Q3 2028). The longest timeline is for aligning routes with the updated standards and completing a formal review of service priorities with Council input (Q4 2028). Residents can read the full report at oagottawa.ca. Mayor [Mark Sutcliffe](/on/ottawa-2026/candidates/mark-sutcliffe), who has committed to a $95 monthly transit pass, has his transit promises tracked at the [Ottawa promise tracker](/on/ottawa-2026/tracker). ## Sitemap See the full [sitemap](/on/ottawa-2026/sitemap.md) for all pages.