Full transit service should be available to Ottawa residents within a month after the ongoing strike ends — much sooner than the city estimates, officials of the union representing striking transit workers said Tuesday.

Maintenance workers and mechanics would be prepared to work nights and weekends to conduct inspections and repairs needed to ensure the city's fleet of 1,000 buses is road-worthy as quickly as possible, veteran OC Transpo mechanic Hugh Thayer said at news conference on the 42nd day of the strike. OC Transpo is the public transit company owned and run by the City of Ottawa.

Ontario's Ministry of Transport requires that all buses be inspected and given a safety certificate before being allowed back on the road.

Thayer said he's aware that a lot of the batteries are dead inside the buses, which have been parked since the strike started on Dec. 10.

As long as the buses haven't blown any motors, the whole fleet could be on the road within a month of the strike's end, he estimated.

That is about one-third the amount of time that the city estimated it would take to resume full service.

Even so, there remained no indication Tuesday that the strike would end in the near future, as no new talks between the two sides had been scheduled.

Bus maintenance costs to jump: union

The news conference was organized by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 279, which represents about 2,300 striking drivers, dispatchers and maintenance workers.

The union had some other bad news for Ottawa residents — taxpayers will face horrendous bills for bus maintenance in the next two years, workers said.

Even prior to the strike, many buses had not been regularly inspected, including as many as 400 that are relatively new.

Senior mechanic Peter Theriault said that has voided a lot of their warranties, and the city will be responsible for covering repair costs of up to $30 million that would otherwise have been included with the purchase. The union blames the city for not providing the resources to get the inspections done, and said it has been warning the city about the problem for a year.

400 drivers could be laid off: city

On Monday, OC Transpo general manager Alain Mercier estimated it would take up to 14 weeks after the end of the strike to resume full service and suburban express buses could remain out of service for up to 12 of those weeks.

In addition, more than 400 Ottawa transit drivers could be off work and unpaid for some time after service resumes, some for up to 12 weeks, Mercier said.

OC Transpo's first priority will be buses that run on major arteries and the Queensway, Mercier said at a news conference Monday. It will take three weeks to get 70 per cent of the buses running and another three to five weeks before 80 per cent are on the road, he said.

Express service from Kanata, Barrhaven and Orleans is expected to resume eight to 12 weeks after the end of the strike, Mercier said.

The delays mean more than 400 drivers will be temporarily laid off as soon as the strike is over, he said.

"This strike will, in fact, for our most junior members, affect them in a very negative manner — some of them, up to 12 weeks without pay once this strike is resolved."

Some OC Transpo mechanics told CBC News that after the 24-day strike in 1996, it took more than a month to return to full service, and the city had far fewer buses then.

Mercier said the city has approached the Ontario Ministry of Transportation to see if it will ease up on inspection standards to allow Ottawa buses back on the road a little sooner once the strike is over.

Union members said Tuesday that they believe the ministry could extend the safety certificates for hundreds of the buses because they've been out of service and haven't been racking up milage.

The city has also asked the striking Amalgamated Transit Union to allow mechanics to go back to work immediately and start repairing buses in preparation for the end of the strike. However, the union told CBC News that it declined, considering that no talks have been scheduled since Dec. 23.