Regional Transportation District board members are proceeding with detailed planning to cut bus and train service by up to 20% starting in 2027 — a possible painful-but-necessary public transit retrenchment to help fix the agency’s $215 million annual budget deficit.
The directors voted unanimously at an operations committee meeting on Wednesday night to task RTD service planners with identifying specific reductions in service hours, frequencies, and routes, and to present them later this month. The planners will propose combinations of cuts to achieve service reductions of 15%, 17.5%, and 20%.
A 20% service cut would save an estimated $62 million to help close the $215 million annual deficit and balance the agency’s $1.5 billion budget. It would mean eliminating 7,300 hours of bus and train service per month across RTD’s 2,345-square-mile service area, according to agency documents.
For months, the directors have been wrestling with the implications of service cuts, including the risk that they could accelerate the decline in RTD’s ridership, which has decreased by nearly 40% since 2019. Those supporting service reductions say that, if cuts must be made, they should target runs where buses and trains are mostly empty while preserving the public transit people use.
“There are no other options that sustainably get the budget back into balance. The reason why we should cut service when people are not using it is because that has the least impact on our customers,” RTD Director Chris Nicholson said.
If voters in 2028 approve a tax hike for public transit, then RTD service could be “dramatically expanded” again, Nicholson said. “What we’re doing is starting on a path to right-size RTD. These cuts would show voters where we’re headed if voters don’t take action in 2028.”
The funding that RTD receives, mostly from sales taxes, hasn’t been enough to cover rising costs for labor, fuel, maintenance, and programs such as free fares for youth.
In April, RTD managers recommended a service cut of at least 20%. Since then, the agency’s 15 directors have looked for other ways to balance their budget, including fare hikes, grant funding, reduction of managerial and executive jobs, and debt restructuring. They’ve anguished about the impacts service cuts would have on metro Denver residents who rely on public transit.
But the numbers don’t add up, forcing consideration of other savings, possibly by cutting early morning, late night, and weekend bus runs.
The decision this week marked a shift by the board toward accepting the agency managers’ recommendation.
“We need to come to the hard reality,” said Director Julien Bouquet, who previously served as the board chairman and represents the south Denver suburbs, including Littleton.
If RTD does not balance the budget for 2027, the financial institutions that RTD relies on for funds needed for large projects, such as maintaining tracks and bus fleets, could downgrade the credit rating, RTD’s chief financial officer Kelly Mackey has told directors. Colorado law and RTD’s fiscal policy require .
Over the past three months, Director Karen Benker, who chairs the RTD’s finance committee, led the efforts to reduce transit spending without cutting service.
“Finance committee members are reluctant to cut service, but the operations committee members just voted for deep cuts. We are divided,” Benker said Thursday, urging public input before final decisions are made.
“If RTD goes down this path of chopping service, we will continue to decline in ridership and relevance, and we will lose the faith of the taxpayers. Some on the board want to seek a tax increase in 2028 because of our deficit situation. If RTD slashes service, there will be no interest by the taxpayers to bail us out. We are leaving our customers stranded–waiting for a bus that never comes.”
RTD chief executive and general manager Debra Johnson told directors she will instruct the agency planning staff to identify the service cuts required for each scenario and present that information at a board meeting later this month.
Meanwhile, directors are mulling whether they can afford to maintain their ban on ads that block bus and train windows and are highly unpopular among riders. They’re planning to launch a new, hourly bus service, funded by a state grant, linking Longmont with Denver International Airport. They plan to revive RTD’s BroncosRide bus service, which would deploy 92 buses on routes from 18 locations around metro Denver to the football stadium, at an additional cost of about $1.6 million. And RTD officials confirmed that they’re still hiring bus and train operators to fill vacancies, offering $4,000 bonuses, with at least 24 of training.
