Friday, February 27, 2009

Toronto Transit Commission no longer the model

Having been a TTC commuter now for 3 months now I can truly say that it's the armpit of Toronto. In the last month there have been a number of shootings on trains and buses, and one instance of two youths being pushed in the path of an oncoming train.

Delays are are as common as trains are on time.  Escalators work about 50% of the time. For one week an escalator at one of Toronto's busiest stations King, was not working. So people leaving from and going to the platform were share a single narrow stairwell. This resulted in people not being able to get to onto a waiting train because they were all stuck upstairs trying to get down as people came up. Of course none of the TTC employees standing around could care less.

I could go on and on. But I think you get the message. By the way, did I mention those fat overpaid TTC workers are all rude and obviously don't like their job; despite getting a paid $80K for sitting on their duff dispensing tokens and talking on the phone all day. 

When I was a youth, the TTC was a model around the world for mass transportation. Now it's a complete joke. Look to Spain, France, Japan and London for example and you'll see mass transit as it should be.

TTC Chair Adam Giambrone is failing at his job. His youth and hence inexperience truly shows that he is out of his element. It doesn't matter how many languages this wiz kid can speak, the truth of the matter is that he cannot lead and does not have a vision for Toronto's transportation future. I really don't care about new services like, emailing or texting train delays. How about cell phone and Blackberry service underground. Who cares? Just get the trains to run on time. Those countries I mentioned all have well run and massively connected routes, Toronto has essentially only 3 subway lines and a bunch buses and can't get it right.
But not all the blame can go to Adam. There's no money, or maybe those at City Hall doesn't know how to ask.  And clearly transportation should not be at the municipal level, but instead provincially run.

I'm saving $400 per month by not having a car, but I wonder if it's really worth the hassle. And based on the number of drivers downtown I think they decided it's not worth it.





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