Within the framework of the current fare system (without a total overhaul), this is what I'd like:
$5 Peak hours fare. (say boarding 6:00-9:00am and 3:00-6:00pm)
$2.50 off-peak fare, youth fare anytime
Extend free fare zone to encompass the flood plain: Erlton, Sunalta, Sunnyside, Bridgeland. But at peak hours it's a $2.50 fare.
Teenagers can get an annual pass at the seniors rate ($169). It can be administered through schools onto student IDs like UPass (which provides a channel to deal with miscreants). It's weird that youth fares are 66% of adult, but youth monthly passes are 73% (35 trip breakeven compared to 32 for adults). I'd be happy to heavily subsidize youth mobility. I think you'd also get a a good chunk of middle+ class parents happy to pay that just so they can say "take the bus".
Anyone U25 can get UPass for same rate as Upass (on the same trimester schedule)
Keep adult monthly passes about the same, or maybe a slight increase; higher peak fares should lead to more monthly passholders. I think it's fine that our commuter style system has a lower number of trips to breakeven than most bigger cities, where you are much more likely to use transit on evenings/weekends. Not sure it would be really necessary, but you could do an off-peak/flood-plain pass at 50% the cost - and those users could top up with a 2.50 fare for peak hours trips.
So a bit of a hybrid zone/time based system, without having to totally overhaul the system. In the end it's more complicated and would generate less revenue - so pretty great! But fare revenue is an arbitrary number and I think it would be worth a short term reduction to make transit cheaper/easier for young people and convert more of them into lifelong riders. It's also a bit of a subsidy to people living in the core.
