The city of Swift Current will have an entire new fleet of buses by early next year after city council approval tonight.

Council unanimously approved multiple motions to purchase three new buses, two for Swift Transit and one for Access Transit, for a cost of just over $454,000.

The city will be on the hook for around $399,000 of the purchase as they received provincial help from the Transit Assistance for People with Disabilities Funding to a toon of $55,000. The city budgeted to replace the two Swift Transit buses in the 2019 and 2021 capital budget for $170,000 each and for the Access bus in the 2020 capital budget for $130,000.

"Busing is an expensive proposition and we need to provided that service for people who need it," Swift Current councillor Ron Toles said. "I'm glad we got some grant money, glad we're able to spread it out over three different budget years. It's just an expense we will have to bite and make happen for the people of our community."

Swift Current Mayor Denis Perrault said the past two years, while council was crafting their capital budgets, one of the toughest debates was to remain in the busing business or not and he was even on the fence until a few facts were provided to him.

"What helped me a lot was when we did our survey last year, with a challenge to our team that we wanted to have a lot of numbers put into that survey," he said following city council. "We were doing it at Market Square and Broncos games... The key pieces to that was that for every three people to one, the three people not being bus users and the one being a bus user, they were asking, overwhelmingly, in fact over 80 per cent said they want buses to continue on in Swift."

According to the city just under 1,400 people partook in the survey with 80 per cent of respondents deeming daily transit an important service and 85 per cent felt that the transit system was vital to support community events.

The other detail that was provided to council was that the new buses will be paid for within five years due to the costly upkeep on the older fleet they're currently running.

"What I like about this one more than anything is the buses we did have are far past life, not really being efficient and the buses we will be bringing online we will be seeing a $75,000 savings annually," he said.

Mitch Minken, the city of Swift Current's general manager of infrastructure and operations, said ridership had been increasing year-over-year for Swift Transit from 24,000 riders in 2015 to 30,000 last year, but COVID will almost certainly hurt those numbers this year.

"We certainly have more room for growth," he said. "It has been growing. Obviously this year all bets are off with people hunkered down we are not seeing that. But we assume that will grow back. Through our partner SaskAbilities who operates it, we've got some marketing campaigns on the go to try and increase ridership."

The Access Transit line provides roughly 6,500 riders per year curb-to-curb service for people with disabilities that aren't able to use the public transit.

The two 1997 new flyer buses and the 2006 Chevrolet bus will head to the auction block sometime next year when the city has its annual disposal sale. Minken believes the 2006 bus could draw some significant interest from smaller communities but doesn't expect they'll receive a huge chunk of coin for the two late-90s buses.

No exact date was given for when the city expects to receive the buses from Saskatoon's Crestline Coach Ltd. but noted it should be in early 2021.