The Canadian Roadgeek

I think 7, 8, 12 needs a major cleanup, but with the university petition, I don't think the 2015 service change (at least the cleaning up 7 part) will actually be put into place... which is kind of depressing because the petition is so misleading, yet 1,200 short-visioned students (sorry for the blunt word use here) signed it anyways... 7D/7E ending up staying means more and more complaints over the route...

What does everyone think about the 7D/7E cut? The university community seems confused and they have this petition where 600+ people have already signed to keep 7D/7E....

First of all, I'll deal with that list. Let me number it as follows: 1) Passengers yelling at you for being late 2) Passengers yelling at you because it snows 3) Passengers yelling at you because you had the audacity to ask them for a fare 4) Passengers refusing to pay the fare 5) Passengers trying to use invalid transfers 6) Passengers trying to use invalid passes 7) Passengers yelling at you for telling them to quit horsing around on the bus 8) Passengers assaulting you for all of the above 9) Passengers spitting on you for all of the above 10) Motorists cutting you off 11) Motorists yelling at you for being in their way 12) Homeless people asking for free rides 13) Homeless people spitting on you for denying said free ride (more gross than normal passenger spitting on you) 14) Passengers sitting up front and talking to you about how Chinese people shouldn't drive or some other racist inappropriate drivel you don't want to hear about. 15) Schedules that are impossible to follow 16) Workshifts that would be illegal in any other industry (like 9 hour shifts without any breaks) 17) Workshifts that are all over the place and prevent any semblance of a social life 18) Fires in the subway that you get to go to track level to put out 19) Other nonsense at track level in the subway that has you working within inches of a 600V electrified third rail 20) Sticking your head out of a moving train while guarding 21) Passengers spitting on you as you stick your head out of a moving train while guarding 22) Passengers smacking you with something as you stick your head out of a moving train while guarding 23) People jumping in front of your train while driving 24) People pretending to jump in front of your train while driving 25) Passengers fighting on your vehicle 26) Gangs fighting on your vehicle 27) People shooting each other on your vehicle 28) People stabbing each other on your vehicle 29) People shooting you 30) People stabbing you 31) People threatening to do either because you want them to pay a fare 32) Vehicles having mechanical problems 33) Passengers yelling at you because your vehicle has a mechanical problem 34) You having to fix the mechanical problem (in the case of streetcars and subways) 35) People having medical emergencies on your vehicle 36) Passengers yelling at you because you stopped for said medical emergency 37) People getting on your vehicle after having been assaulted crying for you to call the police 38) Passengers yelling at you because you stopped your vehicle to call the police for said passenger 39) Passengers yelling at you because you really needed to pee mid-route on a line that does not have washrooms at one or both ends 40) Passengers yelling at you because you're early at an intersection and held for time while staying on the vehicle 41) Passengers yelling at you because you're early at an intersection and held for time and left the vehicle to pick up a snack on your 9 hour shift without breaks 42) Passengers confused that you short turned despite announcing it several hundred times en route 43) Passengers yelling at you for being short turned 44) Passengers confused because you're driving the 29A and not the 29 and thus turned at Tycos 45) Passengers yelling at you for being a 29A and not a 29 46) Passengers assaulting you for being a 29A and not a 29 47) Drunk people horsing around on your vehicle 48) Drunk people puking on your vehicle 49) Drunk people assaulting you 50) Drunk people puking on you 51) Stringed out drug users on your vehicle 52) Stringed out drug users assaulting you 53) Stringed out drug users threatening to give you Hepatitis (anyone remember the Twoonie Lady?) 54) People *ahem* conceiving on your vehicle 55) Little kids screaming on your vehicle 56) Little kids jumping around your vehicle while the parent ignores them 57) Passengers yelling at you because little kids are jumping around your vehicle 58) Parent yelling at you because you told the little kids to sit down and behave 59) Parent assaulting you because you told the little kids to sit down and behave Allow me to demonstrate. Yelling is a form of assaulting, and therefore yelling = assaulting. And who's doing the yelling/assaulting, what form of assaulting it is, and what the topic is about, is essentially is the same thing. And therefore, 1) to 3), 7) to 9), 10) and 11), 21) to 22), 36) to 46), 57) to 59) are essentially the same thing. So that narrows down the list to 36 things. And some of these are directed strictly to driving a train or a bus or a streetcar. So that splits the list into three separate things. For instance, the chance for a person shooting or stabbing a driver is (I would say) 1E-5% on a subway train, unless this is a carefully planned murder. On average, there's barely a chance to interact / talk with their subway driver, and they're not dealing directly with fares. So this chance is drastically reduced. For shooting / stabbing, everything between 27) to 30), On a bus, protector screens have been installed, so your risk of getting hurt has also been drastically decreased, perhaps 0.1%. And given only (on average) one assault made per day, the chance of this falling upon you out of 11,000 personnel on a average day is 1/11000, which is 0.009091%, which means in a year, you only have a 3% chance of getting this, and (I'm not using advanced data management skills here, so this maybe significantly skewed), you need at least a ~33 years experience to get assaulted at least once, and hopefully if you worked 33 years, you should be smart enough to avoid that by avoiding further provocation to the "angry passenger". And also the chance of assault is a little higher in nighttime (especially late night) than in the day, and there are way more drivers in the day than in the night, so therefore, your chance is also reduced. Numbers 4 to 6 are essentially the same thing for fare evasion. So that narrows down the list further. 10) and 11) are essentially the same. Motorists are passing you because the bus is slow, average speed, like I said is 20 km h^-1, where as a car's average speed is at least 40 km h^-1. They're not going to spend the extra time following a bus, when they can save time passing your bus. It's an obvious thing, and it's bound to happen unless busses start travelling at 40 km h^-1 (on average) like the other automobiles. 54) That's the most nonsense thing I've heard. How often does it really happen? Any stats on that? Once a year? 43) That's sometimes a driver's fault. I've been on the 25 Don Mills, the bus short turns at Deerford, but the driver didn't give us an adequate notice, the driver told us it was short-turning at Finch Av (and I was going to Finch Av), so I stayed on the bus, but by Fairview Mall Dr, the driver says, we're short-turning the next stop. Like what? That was totally unexpected. And short turns are so common on some routes, and it's a scheduling problem, and it's TTC's fault for such. Sometimes short turns are so common, they might as well create another branch for the route. And the lack of notice does not stop there. I understand the point of short-turning, and it might be a quick thing since the driver realizes that there's not enough time to go to the end of the route and back. But what really pisses many is that when they board the bus, take the 25 for example, it says "To Steeles", but unknowingly, it says "To Finch" during some point on the route, and the driver does not really notify the passengers until the last minute (i.e. after Don Mills Station) in some cases. So you really can't blame for passengers being mad. And for a record, Toronto is a civilized city, not all passengers yell. The situations you are reflecting is only a small group of people that may only happen in certain parts of the city at certain time of the day/night, which does not impact every single 11,000 employees. 32) and 19) The driver does not really fix it, but rather, sit and wait for the repair crews and come and fix it. And like I said, not every passenger yells, and if they do, emotion management is very important in jobs as such (customer service). When you call for Rogers to help fix your Internet cable, and you yell at them, "why is my internet disconnected?", you would yell at them, and they've been trained not to yell back, and they merely "accept it". If they don't, then they're not a professional customer sales rep. And if it's really unbearable, there's recorders and security cameras (in terms of the TTC) that takes down the entire process, and you report to your supervisor. 31) People threatening to do what? For like 47) to 53), there should be an emergency help button on the bus (if there's none, they should implement one), so that the TTC Special Constables come and solve the problem. It's not really up to the driver to solve the problem. If they spit at you, you've got your protective plastic cover. A taxi driver could be in the same situation too, and they are in a much smaller vehicle than you are, and may not have other witnesses. And why do we have TTC special constables? To keep the TTC safe for everyone, passengers and drivers. So leave those issues with them. You don't clean your buses in most cases anyways. There are cleaning staff for cleaning up pukes. TTC drivers normally doesn't clean their buses, like picking up leftover Metro newspaper and such, while on the other hand, Miller drivers for the YRT, I've seen them doing that, even though there are cleaning stuff. So that's not much to worry about. I've seen puking leftovers on a bus before and it's not really taken care of until the route reaches the end. 35), 54) etc. Many of the stuff you've stated here are really rare cases of emergencies, like conceiving on a bus. Emergency management anyone? In such case, every job has emergencies. Going back to the taxi driver, someone could have conceived in a taxi. They could have conceived in a grocery store. They could have conceived while waiting in line for a new health card, they could conceive in a food court. They could conceive in Shoppers Drug Mart. They could conceive in a convenience store. Anywhere you can think of. Practically every job that deals with people has a chance of that. 41) You shouldn't be leaving your bus. I don't mind if you stand up, stretch a bit, walk around the bus. But it's really unprofessional to leave your bus unattended, when everyone just get on and off freely, without paying fare or anything. 23) and 24). They could be solved with platform screen doors, which someone thought was expensive and outweighs the benefit. And on average, there's ~30 attempts per year, while there are more than 100,000 (I would suspect) subway trips taken every year. For that to happen on you, the risk is less than 0.03%. Bus drivers worldwide have to deal with many of these, while they accept lower salaries and benefits, notably in Asian countries. In Japan or Hong Kong or Taiwan, the cost of living is no less than Toronto, perhaps even more in Tokyo or Hong Kong. And I'm not even requesting TTC employees to decrease their salary to that level. 14) This brought to my attention that a lot of drivers talk to their customers during their route, which they should not be doing. I find it really unprofessional if they're chatting with someone while driving. I don't know if the TTC bans that, but many places I know ban that. I mean, concentrate on your driving, you can always chat later. 16) Many healthcare industries have longer workshifts than you. And in such case, it's the management's problem. And I have work to do, and no time to write this further. But you should get my point. I'll further elaborate this if this is necessary.

7 minutes is pretty late (I think the standard is something like 5 minutes max?), enough to start causing bunching ups if you're running a frequent-service route. And how can you explain a 30+ minutes with no bus in a densely populated community, not some suburban community, when the road conditions are clear (no snow on the ground, no crashes along the route, less cars than usual days), since it was off-peak hours? And from her I also heard that this is not the first time it happened. A sh*tty planned schedule would not cause 2 buses ahead mysteriously disappearing. Umm... I thought the reason for keeping TTC public was because (I think 70%?) 70% of the fund for the TTC comes from the farebox. And it's a pride TTC takes, being the least subsidized transit system. So the riders pay 70% of your salary. So we're your customer, we're your "boss" in quotes, at least 70%. And I think there's customer service along with that? Tactics to deal with customers? There are courses on that, maybe you should start taking them, and at least learn how to treat your customers. Even though it's the customers' faults, you still talk to them, kindly and gently, and explain the situation with a smile, and not be grumpy and start swearing. Not the way to go, and not the customer service level I'd expect for any organizations in 2011. In some big corporations, customers come first, not the workers. Why do you think Apple bother selling customer service (Genius Bar and all sorts of supports)?

This is what you do, to keep it clean. Add platform screen doors, so newspapers don't start flying when a train comes in. And impose a strict fine on littering, or simply put more bins around (but that's rejected due to the fear of "someone starting a fire or hiding a bomb in there", as I have read somewhere in CPTDB) Not everyone has a Facebook account. In the Toronto network, less than a million has a Facebook account (in 2008, there was 0.5 million Torontonians with a Facebook account). Even so, less than half takes transit, and not everyone cares about transit, and will not go about searching for fan pages... Even the "official" (actually I'm not sure if it's the official) TTC page has ~1,200 members. That's like one-third of the 3,670 you've counted. And after you've added those up, I've found another bunch of groups, varying in size between 7 to 300 members. And yet that bus for that driver is late for 6-7 minutes. No excuse for that? I don't believe it. And as a bus driver, you're doing customer service to us passengers. By accepting this job, you've accepted the fact that you might be "treated poorly" by the customers. The customers are sort of your "boss". And I don't think there are many employees who really doesn't get yelled at by their boss once in a while. I'm not the first one who implemented this sarcasm, when others are doing that first. And it was him who started this disrespect, and if he can say something like that, I should be allowed to do so too. I didn't provoke anything. The first provocation was made by rocketdriver2019 about the list of BS that they are going through, and the graph from University of Ryerson claiming that I'm a neo-liberal economist (which I'm not), with no equality and no environmental concerns. These are fairly provoking too, and that long list with repeated items over and over again, calling me "douche feeling brave behind a keyboard" when I'm just pointing out drivers are paid too much, and then with MSM's speech of "get your head out of your ass" or something like that. The fact that I have "no life". Don't you think that's really provoking? I'm not doing much provoking here. And then with the word "BS" spelt out, then with the cartoon picture, then the "leave the kid in the sandbox" comment. Then there's this "secretly jealous and watching porn in your mother's basement". All offensive comments, and I didn't trigger it. I haven't been really doing much, only been responding to these provocation. They're the one who started it, and keeps on elevating it. Well, don't assume I'm doing planning then. And by the way, I did do some research on the history before 1921. There's a lot built before 1921, such as an extensive of network of streetcars already by 1912.

The thing is, most TTC stations aren't clean. There's Metro newspaper laying everywhere, and when a train arrives at the station, the newspaper flies everywhere, transfers got trashed on the floor and sh-mushed up when someone walks in and steps on it with a wet shoe. And the dim and drowsy lighting is not very appealing either. And many stations does not have good ventilation or has too good of a ventilation that it's too cold in the winter (i.e. like Lawrence West, Yorkdale, to name a few)... And while I'm at those stations, not to mention the waiting area (the areas blocked off where you can sit) looks like they haven't been cleaned for 30 years. If your standard claims the stations in Metro Montreal looks good (personally I only think Berri-UQAM is the one that's acceptable / looking good)... then you're pretty much saying every subway station on earth looks good. First of all, quitting their job is an advice for them. It's all from good hearts. If you see someone suffering so much from their job, like as they described, the first thing you'd say is, quit your job. And it's not like they're respecting me either. I haven't necessarily "shown" them the transit system, but taking them around requires in taking a bus (since I don't drive), and it's their comments. I have never said anything about the transit system. I haven't been feeding them any information. They were like it looks so advance from pictures and tour guides, but when you try it out, it's really behind. <-- and this is even referring to something as "innovative" as Viva. There's this constant comment that comes up, cleanliness. The cleanliness on trains, buses, simply disgusts them. And I've gotten numb to these things. I remember being like that years ago when I'm first on transit. Another thing, walking for a long distance, something that they really dislike. And yet on the other hand, I got used to walking. I'm not complaining. They're not used to it. I see you've been doing some political science in Carleton. And what a nice way to put together your knowledge. It's videos that others put up, not me. I'm just saying, disgusts of the TTC can be found anywhere on the net. And finding that was effortless, imagine if I find more. The "TTC pisses me off" group on Facebook has over 400 members, "Overhaul the TTC", almost 200 members, "Privatize TTC", ~70 members, "Love/Hate relationship with the TTC" (Love because they need it, Hate because it really sucks, but we have no choice), close to 3,000 members, and there's this former group called "TTC = Take the Car", but I can't find that one right now. 3 groups are created under that title, but it wasn't the one I joined. But these 3 groups combine to have at least 100 members. Well, doesn't the "Keep the TTC Public" campaign constantly compare to the "core 4 cities", Auckland, Melbourne, London, and Vancouver. It's like they are the only 4 cities on the globe. Running campaigns? It'll be like Liu Xiaobo in China, given all the reactions here. I know the difference and the reason why. I'm just suggesting we can do better than getting stuck in the 1970s, and start putting more money to transit. And if the government refuses to, we have to get the resource off somewhere... I lived in Hong Kong for 11 years. I know well that MTR makes most of its profit from real estate. I have friends who live in estates of the MTR. And I've been to shopping centres numerous times that's owned by the MTR. What did the TTC do to fix that narrow platform? Nothing. At least put up like barriers or some sort if you're not going to bother to expand that platform. Do we have to wait till one person falls onto the track due to overcrowding, either got shocked by the electricity on the tracks or run over by an incoming train, then we know we'll need to solve that problem? If you're saying it's not the original construction's fault, then we should think of ways to fix it now, before tragedy happens. Minimalist? So that includes ones with so dim of a lighting that makes a hotbed for crime or one that you can't see what's ahead of you, and the gloominess just consumes you all? I'm not thinking of something grand like the Union Station Concourse Level. I just want the platforms to be wider, have screen doors, have better lighting (at least till Don Mills Station lighting level). That's all I'm asking. Kipling and Kennedy do look really bad, I would have thought it's from the 60s as opposed from 79/80. Veolia operates sleek transit as a matter of fact that I've learned from their site. And I appreciate that, and as far as I can tell, they're doing a pretty good job in running public transit. Veolia does not comply with what the union wants for a reason. Sometimes what the union wants is outrageous. And you don't know what you don't know. My career is not what you think it is. And don't stalk like that. "Fu", interesting. Due to my heritage, the first thing that came to mind was 富 (fu in Cantonese/Mandarin romanization) or 福 (fu in Mandarin romanization), meaning fortune (the first meaning fortune as in money/rich, and the second as in fortunate). Or 褲 (fu in Cantonese romanization) meaning pants. And FYI, I'm not the first one to start using the acronym, but Rocketdriver2019 or some person that goes by this name started first. He said "likely because they see the BS that we go through on a daily basis". I could have been just inferring to him. And I said, "TTC operator trying to save their job and continue with this BS with the current transit system", it could be studying a Bachelor of Science for public transit planning, it could be bus stops, it could be Behavioural Science with the current transit system. Well on the other hand, you've started using Fu first in this case. We do live in a communist state, in a sense. Really, other than freedom of speech and the eligibility, it really does seem like communism, doesn't it...? It's not supposed to happen, yes. The woman asked the driver. The driver shrugged. He says, "I don't know. There's supposed to be 2 in front of me." Well, where did the 2 go? And it was on a cold winter day too. And these happen very frequently for me, especially during rush hours. The general public would refuse walking beyond 300 m. It's a major push factor that the TTC imposes on the general public, especially on stormy days or frigid days. As a matter of fact, where I live, I have to walk out 750 m even on a regular day. That's a 10-minute walk. Sundays this deteriorates to 1000 m. Well, in Paris, I'm not referring to all of them, but look at some of them, like Saint-Lazare, they actually bothered to renew it and add screen doors for some platforms, better lighting, when the station is 106 years old, and not to mention the newer part with Line 14 looks amazing. On one hand, you're complaining how I'm "insulting" you drivers here. On the other hand, you're not making much nice comments about me either. "the kids". Way to go, like some of you said, I'm really offended by that. And what I've been saying is the truth, it's true that most of the active members here are drivers. If you are so passionate of your job, you shouldn't be denying that and be proud that I stated that fact. And by my math, that takes away 90% not 80%. And I was in boycotting all of you for roughly 4 hours. But you guys continue with this insult and nonsense, which brings me back to the table, especially the person named MSM. I don't need to see a buttock of a bull, thank you very much. And that's a suggestion of profanity, which also runs into the CPTDB rules. And it's not like I'm the only one who spread hateful messages. You clearly did too, right there, and numerous posts before. And it's not your first time swearing on CPTDB either, as I've seen some of your previous posts. The GO is operated by the provincial government, and since they're not putting any money to the TTC, they have more money to work with the GO Transit. And I do agree, the GO is so much more attractive than the TTC. It appears to me that you don't understand what Veolia is doing there. Veolia can ALSO post FREE ads on their own site, but chooses to go to Kijiji cause more people look for jobs there. Why the heck, when you're looking for jobs, to think of Veolia as the first thing? And you don't need an effort to put an ad on your own website. I did quit for 4 hours. Didn't you see? But your highness, Sir MSM, kept on adding this hypocrisy thing, as if it's a fun word to use. And there, you've broken a rule on abusive and harassing my beliefs right there. "pretending to have beliefs and feelings", that's what you saying I have. And that's a violation and abuse and harassment of my own beliefs and feelings. It's Canada here, and I say what I stand for, like what buschic says, I speak my mind, if you don't like it, don't read it then. Don't say that I'm a hypocrite. And that's a way worse offense than simply commenting that you all here are bus drivers, which is a wonderful job. You think you're hilarious with the hypocrite thing but I'm sorry, you're not, and that was a really bad joke that shouldn't have made in the first place. I am a human, with feelings and all, and it's not your job here to start saying I'm a hypocrite, with proof too, which is non-existant. All I've said here represents everything I stand for, and it's true with no lies. And you, sir, have insulted my religion, my family, my pride, my heritage, my values, my life, my everything. It's a serious word to use, and you here, is not giving me the basic human rights. I doubt you even think I'm human, or at least an human with no feelings and one for you to make fun of. Don't even say that again, to anyone, including your passengers (if you're a driver), or the person sitting beside you (if you're not a driver), and certainly not to others waiting at a bus stop. And I'm not doing any customer service, nor working for you, so you really have no right to say that to me. And quoting on Waiting for 30 minutes, Wikipedia, boy do we start trusting you now. And not to mention they worked out the fare by the distance you travel. And they make a lot of money with having stores inside the stations.

Try Hang Hau Station. Also the same opening date. You're calling all Metro Montreal's stations look nice, so I just randomly picked Jean-Drapeau, and... OK, if that's your definition of beauty I have nothing to say about you... And the list, I'll get back to that momentarily. I have to work too and I have a life. Your list was a list of nonsense with many and I do mean many overlapped items, that could be knocked down one-by-one, but I'll get to that after.

Take it this way. An average commuter thinks differently than a public transit operator or enthusiast. Just because 90% of the posts here are made by a public transit operator or enthusiast does not mean 2.3 million other Torontonians think the same way. And we've had enough with the TTC. Basically, if the government is not going a superb job, then let a private company do it. If you don't want that to happen, then start fixing it so all of this anti-public TTC voice will stop.

Posting on a forum is not a job, experience does not count. Not necessarily you, but you as in the drivers / operators as a collective. Like someone said before, get your head out of your ***, or something like that. Go search for the previous posts and you'll see what I mean.

I have no problem with having bus drivers on here. I'm pointing out the truth that this board has a significant number of bus drivers. What's wrong with that? It's not rude, it's saying the truth. Many of your comments here are very rude and uncalled for in terms of the rest of the Torontonians. Most of the Torontonians think the same way, especially people who choose to drive because the TTC is not appealing. Well, then, tell me another way to get money to fund the infrastructure, other than privatizing. The city is broke, the provincial government doesn't care, and the federal has too much other things to care about anyways. How else? Donations?

It's not just me who hates the TTC. . The government way of doing things. BS is an acronym that can stand for many things. It does not have to be a vulgar word. Whereas Mr. MSM however, it was spelt full out. So I'm sorry to ruin your day 63 Ossington. And in fact, BS as a vulgar word is the third last of the list of BS on Wikipedia. Don't believe me? Check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BS So you're saying... the government's purpose is to serve EVERYONE. Have they been successful doing that? No, maybe it's time to hand it over to a private company and let them take the profit. You call walking 1 km during off-peak hours on Sunday as "serving everyone" when a government runs it. I don't think a private company can do worse than that. Oh really. I was on the 100 Flemingdon Park the other day at around 11:15 AM, and the poor woman there with her infant child stood in the cold for 30 minutes (as she claims that she has been standing there since 10:45 AM), and there has been no buses coming by when the TTC promises 10 minutes per bus. And there wasn't any accidents, road closures, bad weather along the route. And she's not the only one. I've been through waiting for the TTC for 45 minutes when they promised 5 minutes a bus. And again, no apparent reason along the route. But communism is when the government owns the transit system. Well, the Western world still considers China as a communist country, and their government owned transit system, you still need to pay your fare. So isn't that wonderful? Exactly the same as the TTC. And that was one of the public shots of the Toronto Rocket. It's on Wikipedia. Now the whole world gets to see how TTC is behind 40 years. And no, the stations aren't the same. They're well lit, almost every corner, even though not much people might be using that area, is brightly lit with white LED lights, when the TTC stations are dimly lit, using barely adequate at the DWA with glowy miserable yellow-orange light. And not to mention the platform width. I feel like I'm going to fall into the tracks when it's crowded. People are forced to walk on the yellow danger zone on the platform because it's simply too narrow. Well that'll never happen in a privately owned system, at least the Asian ones that I have witnessed so far. Kennedy is not even on the route of the line that the Rocket is serving (YUS, unless YUS somehow bends after Finch and goes to Kennedy as an extension), so why is it even lit up? It's trying to confuse the average passenger and that's not an intelligent thing to do. You don't light up interchange stations. You circle them (the TTC way) or you just simply put a long round rectangle (or something like that), not to light it up like the rest of the stations on the YUS line. I lived there for 11 years, seen and witnessed as the system improves everyday. And it's not just Hong Kong, some of the newer stations in Paris look pretty nice, Japanese stations look amazing, now even Mainland Chinese stations are superb, not to mention Taiwanese to go along with it. And Toronto? 9th largest (last checked it was 9th) metropolitan area on North America, and look at how it's done. 1970s style. Nothing improved since then. Still dimly lit, still that narrow platform that can only fit one overweighted person or three slim people like me, side-by-side, or two average person. Hong Kong operates differently than Mainland China, even though it is a part of the country, it's under the two-systems-one-country policy. They do get paid fairly well, not exceptionally high (like North America) nor are they paid minimum wage (which is set $28 HKD). Lack of accessibility? Go do some research before saying that. They've been implementing ways for the handicapped, for the blind, for the deaf, since the 1990s. They have marks on the floor to guide the blind people (the marks can be used with their cane), and they have audible sounds for escalators and elevators. They have platform screen doors. They have large and readable, colour-coded signs everywhere. They have automated barrier-free access for them. Warns the door is closing (actually gives a message in 3 languages and a long 9 beeps, which lasts ~7 seconds, unlike the TTC, dune-dune-dune three beeps, and bam it closes). Talk about the TTC. No money. Period. Sad and dry. All the TTC knows is the kneeling bus. Okay, that's cool, anything else? Oh, if you talk about the MTR, they are treated pretty nicely, and the MTR is not simply Hong Kong, but Beijing and Shenzhen as well. But in TTC standards, maybe poorly because TTC workers are so overpaid. And a funding structure is different because they're private. Right now the taxpayers including those who are motorists, pays everything of the system. When it's privatized, some of it comes from the company, and from the users themselves. And hand and my snow shovel raised so high they touch the roof of my house in suburban Toronto. I'm betting my cheers could be heard through the streets of Toronto, whereas silent throughout the drivers' homes.

Oh no, I'm totally NOT offended. Sorry to disappoint you there buddy. But I said "to refrain using vulgar language" was for your own good before you get banned (but I doubt so since this CPTDB is overpopulated with drivers). According to CPTDB rules,

I'm not comparing service frequency. I'm comparing the stations and the trains. I'm not comparing the software (service) but the hardware (stations, etc.) Look at that. We're in the 2011, wake up! We're not in the 1970s. For all I've known (I've brought many visitors from China and Hong Kong and Japan) to Toronto, and their review on the TTC is negative, and they're saying it's really behind. If you can get the government to advance our technology 40 years, I'll shut up and let the government run this. Do it! We're all laughing at the TTCs right now, those visitors and the new immigrants from Asian and European countries. We thought North Americans can do better than this.

And please refrain from using foul language on this forum. You're just making the public TTC look even worse and disgusting. And private buses tend to be cleaner. Take a look at Miller buses north of Steeles. Tend to be cleaner than TTC buses.

I have been on his bus for many of my childhood days, I've heard stories, I've seen it. And I live in York Region, but my school is in the City of Toronto. I spend 45 minutes (upwards to 60, travelling a distance of about ~8 km) on a TTC bus everyday, and 60 minutes (a distance of about ~16 km) on YRT/Viva. And you say I don't know how TTC operates. "Research" more about me before making (as Articulated says -->) arguments that hold water. Right now yours is not even holding air effectively. FYI, I've seen how private transit works, but YOU have not. I've lived in a city with private transit for 11 years, and been to countries and places with private transit. YOU have no right to say how a private transit does not work untill (typo on purpose to mimic) you have experienced how private transit fails. Have you lived in Auckland, Melbourne, London, Vancouver? (the only 4 cities that seem to exist in the world to you guys, other than Toronto). Go live there for 11 years before coming back and write this. I won't mind sending you an e-mail in 2022 reminding you to come back to Toronto and I bet the subway system map would look more or less the same (except the YUS line extension).

The "Keep TTC public" is a piece of propaganda, that's using OUR money (not yours), trying to keep yourself a nice job. Way to go TTC. Quoting rbairos1 on YouTube, "Did you include Hong Kong or Japan? How many of my tax dollars went into this propaganda? Can't even comment on the vids for proper debate." Quoting 044930 on YouTube, "pizza delievry makes 11 - 12 $per hour courier drivers made 14 $ truck drivers made 18 -24 $ ttc drivers made more than so many still they went on strrike every year no special skill for driving going privaticed may not be good idea cutting in wages of staff and bringing down fare will be better choice and dont ask for taxpayer money plz". Quoting donricodelavega, "Why are you disabling comments on your videos? Afraid negative backlash from angry TTC riders will taint your positive videos?" Quoting JellyChang, "True~! Privatize will be a good idea since no more union and also cut back on the wages~!!! It is way too high now~! Who said privatize is no good? Check out the Hong Kong MTR~! they are running as private company and their service is brilliant~!". It's the voice of all Torontonians. And you're trying to censor all your comments and videos. And you can tell your propaganda is not working well, only 11 subscribers on YouTube, and I bet 10 out of 11 are drivers of the TTC.

As a matter of fact, my grandpa was a bus operator in the 1950s to early 2000s. When I was still ~10 years old, I was on his bus and I see these stuff. It's not stressful as YOU would think, even though he works overnight sometimes. And also, I joyride quite a fair bit, so I'm with a TTC driver many times. I sit in the front seats all the time, you don't think I spend enough time with a TTC driver? And you live in the Qunite area anyways (population: roughly 10% of Toronto, 200,000 people). Go ride your rural buses instead of adding collections to your list of stupid posts, and making a fool of yourself. And if it's that stressful to take this job. Why the heck are you guys here talking about this? Go get some sleep or spend time with your family while you're saying you're working overtime and NO time with family! You're wasting your own holiday time on this CPTDB. You'll just be asking for more after this, and that will draw more money from us as riders and taxpayers. If you don't care about the station, you'll surely care about the trains. A Tokyo train for the Fukutoshin Line. Versus a TTC train, oh, isn't that nice. Nice active route map for the 2011 Toronto Rocket. And uh... Why's Kennedy lit up? An active route map is already made in ~2001. A private company can do this stuff 10 years ago. Nice try, TTC. And your active route map looks like a piece of elementary school prototype made in the 1980s. And wow, you guys won't even let us Torontonians voice our opinion. Your Keep TTC Public website is censored, and the comments have to be approved to be publish. And guess what comments are published? The ones (mostly) that supports keeping transit public! (I posted twice, each with different completely opinions, and only the one supporting for keeping it public got published)... And you even block rating and comments on your YouTube videos! Talk about communism, your freedom of speech and censoring method for keeping TTC public is worse than China. I don't know why this is allowed in Canada.

Are you guys ashamed? Lok Fu Station, opened in 1979, under a private company: Versus Kipling Station, opened in 1980 (even one year younger than Lok Fu Station): And Po Lam Station, opened in 2002, under a private company: Versus Don Mills Station, opened in 2002 Private companies can afford to make better stations. Whereas under a government, we're limited to limited funds. And where we have to actually cut corners. And all 6,000 operators hogging over the resources isn't helping either. And totally agree with D40-90, if you're so unhappy and so stressed with your job. QUIT IT. If you can't take the stress, you're not deserved to be paid that much. Can't stress that enough (pun intended). And don't complain about your job here.

OK. Right now I have to go out for lunch, and I'll deal with this after I get back. But for some of you who can't read where I'm from, I'm in YRT land, live in a suburban region, and yes, my community bus route comes every 30 minutes. So don't bother using that as an excuse for inadequate bus service.

Now for PART 2 If you provide better announcements on board of the subway trains, like transferring directions, much of this would be avoided. Most people get lost on bus routes anyways, rather than on the subway. And even so, it is the job of any TTC employee or any Torontonians to help out these tourists/non-locals. It's not a "job" specifically directed to collectors. And that's why I emphasize the point with no paper fare, all electronic fare even for one-rides. The job of the turnstile is to check the tickets, not the collectors. Collectors are human and they can't process as much as a turnstile does. With them not having to collect the fares (which then a collector in fact becomes what I suggested as "station managers"), can have more time doing other things, like helping out (seems like all of you are fascinated with collectors helping the tourists), etc. I don't know what is the point behind a metropass or token. We spend like millions and millions of dollars making them every month, while we can invest that on something more constructive. By eliminating the collector, I mean implement a "station manager", i.e. not someone who sits around and sleeps or talks to anyone about their newborn infants. They'll be walking around and doing what you suggested collectors would do, helping others. But of course the salary would be lower, since now the job is more like patrolling. I know for a fact that many people are driving because the TTC isn't attractive. We need marketing strategies, and with the government, the government won't be doing that. Privatizing it, the company will rebrand it, making it a more attractive way to go. There are still a lot of myths, especially to newcomers of Canada, or people who has never taken the TTC before, that TTC is not the best way to go with. And you're exactly right. The government is refusing to do anything about building new subway lines, or charging cars. Either way they're committing political suicide, just that charging cars lead to a faster death. Traffic problems aren't solved. We can't constantly widen roads. What next? The-401 to 30 lanes from the current 22 lanes? And then what? 40 lanes? We don't have room for that, and unless you can fix it without implementing public transit, public transit is the only way to go. And how to get public transit to work? Privatizing. And what about a subway line along Don Mills? Nope, turned down due to the lack of funding. But in a private companies standpoint, it fills the subway line to capacity, hmm, with further research, it might be profitable, and therefore on it builds. Less burden on taxpayers too since a portion of the cost is covered by the company (which is fund generated by the users anyways). If you bring up proper signage and proper announcements, I'm sure that'll reduce a lot of confusion from the tourist. And most of the time the collector doesn't care about the tourists / non-locals. For one, they're impatient, and for two, they have collecting stupid paper fares to deal with and a long line to "solve". With an automatic setup, the "locals" don't really have to be served, you focus on the tourists / non-locals. It's not like you're providing any hard facts either. Repeatedly using the same examples is not holding much water either, in fact, it's leaking. And everyone can see that this is from a perspective of a TTC operator trying to save their job and continue with this BS (sorry for using this word, but no other word choices can be better than this) with the current transit system, as they're hogging too much resources. Even city councillors are willing to deduct their salaries. Rob Ford didn't take extra off the city council as a councillor. And they are responsible for all the intelligent work. You guys are just doing simple tasks (sure you do run into problems, but name a job out there with no problems at all?), and you are getting paid way more than some of the most important jobs out there, plus the benefits over it, and Giambrone claiming so much money off the government. If you add up all these throughout the years, do you think we'll save enough to at least install platform screen doors along the entire Sheppard Line? Or modernize Finch, Union, Kennedy stations? And we Torontonians had enough of this. We don't want to travel back in time every time we're on the TTC. We had enough of lies (and that includes the motto / tagline of TTC "Take the Rocket". A joke that I always make, if TTC is the rocket, then it'll take me a whole year to get to the moon). Take a look at Karen Stintz, with 4 assistants, and those 4 assistants have many more assistants. It's like a small company for one personnel. But this is how government structure works. Jobs overlapping in objectives. Assistants divide into administrative, constituency, and executive x2. Is it really necessary? Like you said private companies cut corners, and this is how they cut corners. No jobs overlapping, which also means saving money. This is not justified at all. You take a piss or do whatever you want to do, eat, drink, rest, laugh, sleep, whatever, during your break, at the terminus of the route, not in the middle of it. This is showing how the TTC operators are not professional. Professional workers don't leave their spots while on duty unless absolute emergency. You don't need to get coffee every run of the route. You get your coffee, get a whole jug of it, and put it on your bus, and drink from it when necessary, but not hopping off the bus in the middle of operation to get coffee. As for staying awake, that's for the supervisor to plan out the schedule for each and every driver, ensuring the driver has an adequate number of working and resting hours. From what you're saying, it's like TTC drivers don't get breaks. Then that's poor management. Hmm, maybe privatizing it and implementing a better human resource department will do the job. A personal care worker who works for 7 days a week and 12 hours a day, and does not have time with his family, does not get as a high a salary as a TTC operator does. And a TTC collector deals with healthy people and fares, while a care worker deals with excrements from dirty and grumpy patients. Who deserves more do you think? And cashiers do point out where stuff might be placed, just like a TTC collector who points out the directions, etc. Well, the consumers have choices of which transport system to take. In this case, GO Transit wins because it offers better fare and better connections. Greyhound and Coach simply withdraws due to the inability to compete. It's the result of the competition. More connections (and better connections) to existent GO Transit services is why GO Transit won. The net gain in transportation of the corridor is better connection (and I suspect the fares are even more appealing for GO Transit). Without a smart card, fare zones don't really work. It's a hotbed for fare evasion. And so I've paid the fare from Union Station to Agincourt Station, but no one will know if I get off at Lincolnville Station. With a smart card, I tap to get on at Union Station, and tap to get off at Lincolnville Station. If you don't tap when you get off, it'll charge you for the maximum fare for the line to make it fair (that's what I propose, and this is aside)... Gas prices are staying firm at 1.14 cents/L recently. It'll soon go up even higher, and motorists would find taking the public transit is more desirable. And don't forget the traffic headache. Long distance commuters are invited to take the express routes (like GO Transit), which makes their fare a lot cheaper. You wouldn't expect someone to travel some 20-30 odd stations from McCowan RT Station to Kipling Station right? It's a matter of implementing better services for long-distance rider and make it more appealing. I know it's a balancing game, and $0.20 was an arbitrary value to illustrate my argument. It would require me to write a long report to justify the cost / km if I were to determine one. I've seen zone fares in many places, I've been out to the real world and see zone fare in action. On the other hand, you might be the one who hasn't been seeing how sophisticated / technologically advanced / glorious a transit system can be in 2011. Try some European or Chinese or Japanese transit systems. Toronto is behind at least 40 years with that scale. Even some videos of Hong Kong MTR in 1970s look way better than some of the sketchy TTC stations we have today. I'm sorry to say, but you and 6,000 other employees are holding Toronto back, are holding TTC back, are holding 2.6 million people back, are holding our time. You know how much time you waste from us everyday? Sorry, getting off topic. You know how long does it take to go from Steeles / Swelles to Kipling / Lake Shore? Check this: Google Transit Directions, 2 hours and 39 minutes. Is $10 reasonable for a 2.5 hour ride? That's 5 hours to and back! I would totally say yes! It worths $20! And who would do that everyday anyways? I spend 1.5 hours, and that's a headache. We need crosstown services, yes, I agree that with you, in fact, discounts can be offered on specially marked crosstown services, as many zone-fare transit agencies have adopted (like over a number of zones, you get a discount). Parts 3 and 4+ tomorrow.

Hi there drivers! When commenting, please take in perspectives from the average citizen not YOU as a driver and the TTC as a public transit system cause you want to keep your job or your salary. I've been writing this for 12 hours, on and off. Sorry for not able to get to any comments beyond "skyfirenet". Will get to that tomorrow. Been getting all worked up, frustrated, and mad from all of this keep it public nonsense. And tired too. Have fun reading! (please forgive grammar errors as at this point I'm spending hours and hours writing this...) I didn't say NOT staff a station. I doubt any transit system, private or not, throughout the world, has a non-staffed station. I said one per station. List out the BS please. You guys are just driving and handing out transfers, how hard could it be? A taxi driver could be in more BS than you guys, getting their vehicle ticketed while parking for lunch, insulted by their passengers, etc. And you say driving a bus is BS? You guys have way more security than a taxi driver, you have security cameras, other people on the bus as witness, etc. And you guys have way more time to take breaks. Trucking and bus driving is different. Trucking is intercity, longer working hours, I don't see how it's less stress. And like YRTteen or now Articulated says 5 posts under, it's basing on YOUR observations, so YOUR argument is loose (I'm just quoting other public transit operators.) No, like you guys said, private companies cut corners. They don't hire 3 people to photocopy. They hire 1. One and only. They have better management since they have to work things out efficiently, they don't have an endless supply of money like the government is drawing from us taxpayers. And as a Hong Kong advertisement goes, "This is not the way of customer service these days." (and this ad from the 2000s). If you're early, drive slower, or park on the side of the street but never leave your vehicles unattended. An entire school of high school kids could easily have got on the bus for free just cause the driver is out of the bus. This should be changed in Canadian Transits. I'm not saying YRT is out of this either. On Route 90, drivers love to stop at Don Mills / Steeles to buy coffee/doughnut. My advice, buy your snacks or whatever in Don Mills Station, when your route is not operating. There's a snack store inside the station. I'm not saying no to eating, just don't buy it on your route. But you see this happening more frequently on TTC routes than YRT routes, just saying. And this is not true for the 3 major bus companies and the railway company. It says clearly that they're not allowed doing that. If they had done that, it'll be on the news the next day, guaranteed. In this case you're HIRING a contractor. In privatizing case, you're LEASING or SELLING your system to a private company. It's the company's property (transit infrastructure), the company should be paying for it. Whereas your bathroom is YOUR property, the contractor takes no ownership in that. It's not like the contractor gets to use your bathroom everyday after it's done refurbishing (I'm sure you wouldn't appreciate that anyways). The private company pays a portion there. Whereas in a government scheme, it's all taxpayers' money. Say like a 1-billion dollar project, and the private company takes 200 million and the government takes 800 million, 800 million comes from the residents of the city, and 200 million comes from the passengers (who should really be paying for it since they're using it). In a government scheme of things, all 1,000 million comes from the taxpayers. And not everyone uses transit. For the ∞th (or yours put it in a more intelligent way 6.84 E 59 th, or 6.84 x 10^59) time, there will be no more collectors in the station. It'd be a station manager who manages the entire subway station, and yes, equivalent to a manager at Wal-Mart. It's up to the government to set the terms when selling the transit system, you can always put a note in the contract that there must be accessible public transits to all parts of the city (~300 m walking distance), or something like that. If you have competition, it's also best for it to set up the system for different areas of the city as their focus. Like in Hong Kong KMB is focused in Kowloon, while connecting passengers to Hong Kong Island, etc. Ummm... why do you think the 407 was built in the first place? Cause it takes double the time to travel the same distance on the 401 than 407. It's the traffic congestion that makes people choose 407. If you have another empty freeway with cheaper cost, people will flee to it. Again, you're missing the point here. The reason why they charge costs on little things in airline is because of the fuel cost. Why did TTC increase their fare? For the same reason, fuel cost (not to mention YOUR salaries) go up. By the way, this was rebutting on the point someone made earlier saying that private companies charges little costs like this. And you're missing the point again... I'm saying the current way of fare in TTC does not work. It has NOTHING to do with privatization. It was a side-note. And of course I know GO Transit is implementing zone fares. It's time for the TTC to do the same thing as well. How do you expect me to find the "responding to emergencies" reliable when they're trying to collect fares or busy talking with others or sleeping (even though the man is dead now...)? Why would we not have a station manager for Queen Station? Anyways, I was thinking a station manager for each station. And walking from King to Queen is not a big deal either. If you run, it's going to be in minutes. That'll be the station managers' job. Help with turnstiles? Wow, it's either the customers are not very intelligent or there's something wrong with the design of the turnstile. Personally, I don't like the exit turnstile. Make them the entrance turnstile-type please. And why would the manager be outside or at another station. They belong INSIDE the station. My overall problem was overpaid and the overall service quality. Station managers aren't really supervisors. They're not supervising everyone. It's just a more intelligent title that handles everything , like you suggest, collectors already do. Therefore, they are not supervisors. And besides, if we're hiring a new group of station manager, that'll save a lot of money, as the starting wage is fairly low. At one point, taking public transit is considered as communism, cause it's owned by the public and the government, and people (still to this date) dislikes (I'm avoiding the word "hate") communisms to this day. And why are you guys trying to bring communism to us when we don't want it? It's for a very selfish reason: To keep your job and your salary and your ever happy life, when we as passengers spend 3 hours on a bus everyday. And in this case you're the one who's a neo-liberal economist. Virtually none of environmental concerns and you're not thinking for the greater-good, but rather more for you and your fellow 6,000 TTC operators. Who's behind the keepttcpublic campaign, the TTC. Want me convinced? Get a non-affiliate group with the TTC to promote this from a non-TTC standpoint, and not some drivers wanting to defend their job. Quit your job before saying anyone as a neo-liberal economist. I'm sorry for being blunt but this is the way it is. CPTDB is overpopulated with drivers, who are trying to show the negative side of privatization (and the examples are always York Region, Vancouver, London, Auckland, Melbourne. Any new ideas? Why not consider the positive side?). You realize that once TTC is privatized, you'll lose your job. If I'm a neo-liberal economist, I wouldn't have pushed public transit ahead. Public transit is caring for the environment, and neo-liberal economist puts me at virtually none of environmental concerns. And you're not considering the equality too. Your value of equality on that graph is exceptionally low, because you're standing at TTC employees' standpoint, of about ~6,000 people. But most of Torontonians (~1 mil), I believe, will stand making TTC better. And how can we make it better? Privatizing. Tell me how the government is going to fund us all a new line. All of the 3 government levels (maybe not the federal, but...) are in deficit. Let's share the cost with a company, let them take the revenue, and we as Torontonians enjoy better transit service. And you know how behind TTC is? No automated station announcement before ~2005 on subway trains and before ~November 2007 on buses. In the 2000s, our TTC system seemed to be stuck in the 1970s. Like your "Keep TTC public" video, TTC was a leader in the 1970s, but you stopped improving, much with government service, and now it's 40 years behind, and counting. (To be continued... next part)

I've never seen a fare collector inside a booth to help people for emergencies. I almost walked past a barrier-free entrance without dropping a fare, just to check if they're paying attention. And the thing is, they're too busy to look elsewhere and talk to others to see even if I dropped a fare (and of course I did drop a fare in the end, that's the right thing to do...), but see how useless these "extra employees" are? And besides, we are going into an electronic age, and the fare media are going to be electronic in the coming years (it's already electronic in many parts of the world, and under the government we're not going to get these innovations.) And we have a station manager, that's the person who's going to help. If we're going to keep this government, the only way I see it is to increase tax (which people are going to say no), and another way is to charge every single vehicle flowing in and out of the Downtown core to fund public transit. That'll increase revenue on the public transit system and also help alleviate the financial dilemma for the City of Toronto. And that's a problem with democracy too (I'm not promoting communism here), but if you look at Beijing, they're planning to implement alternative driving days. In Canada, we can't really force that to happen, but I'm sure people are getting tired of driving on congested roads. One problem here is that buses are on these congested roads, and they're even slower than cars (average speed for bus ~20 km s^-1, that is if we're lucky; and for a car it's 40 km s^-1. It often takes double the time to get from A to B on a bus than on a car (at least for suburban Toronto).) If we can really fix that then that'll convince people to abandon their cars. Well, like I said, we're cutting jobs. If we have ~2 fare collectors per station multiplied by about 69 stations, that's enough to implement auto-fare entrance (I don't see given with our current technology we still need someone to sit in a station to collect the fares. In 2011, you make a machine that counts your fare. Not by some random person.)... We have 7.5 million people in the Greater Toronto Area and 2.6 million in the City proper, and you say we can't find 6,000 drivers that are more qualified? I've seen many drivers that shouldn't be even getting the job. And with a governmental organization, they often assign a job that's capable of one person to like a team of 3 people. Like I've seen government organizations with 3 people photocopying. o_O why 3 people? And even till this day (after all that "bad news" regarding TTC), there are still drivers stopping and buying coffee/doughnut from Tim Hortons. I don't see how people are saying we're subsidizing private transit in infrastructure. Well, without the private companies, we as tax payers have to pay for the entire cost, and now a private company is willing to pay a portion of it (even though a company will charge you for that later, but it's the job of the government to monitor the increase of fare, and try to stop it if it gets out of hand (this should be included in the contract).) I'm just going to put this way: We're not paying $100,000 yearly to a fare collector when we're paying like $10,000 (or even maybe less) for cashiers. Seriously, why are they getting paid like a professional when a high school student can do this job? This is how they make profit: just cutting like 140 fare collectors (assuming 2 per station) saves ~$1,000,000 yearly (which I know is not a lot, but it is money saved). Privatization doesn't fail in every part of the world. Part of the reason privatization fails is cause they're monopoly, much like the TTC, as a saying goes, without competition, there'll never be improvements. Like the 407 doesn't have a competition. See what happens if we build another freeway north of say like Major Mac right now, with way cheaper fares and see what happens. 407's sales is threatened, and that'll power 407 into doing something. For the competition argument, the charging of little things is to make up for the ever-going up fuel cost (and the government charges a lot of tax on the fuel, so it's also on part of the government), it has nothing to do with competition. And the fare scale is not working right now (I understand it's the problem with the paper fares right now... like I said, there should be electronic fare right now. Like no more paper fares), anyhow, it's not fair for a person to travel from say like Bay Station to Sherbourne Station and pay $3.00, where as a person travelling from Steeles / Sewells to say like Kipling / Lake Shore and pay $3.00. You implement zone fares, and that's how you make money too for private companies. You don't just necessarily cut service. For a private company to be successful, you don't just cut service (reduce spendings), you think of ways to increase revenue, and that's zone fare. Like charging $0.20 per km or something like that. If you think that's too expensive, then take GO Transit, it's about the same price. Short-ride customers shouldn't be subsidizing long-ride customers. And you get a lot of money from that.

I understand for the "fear of downsizing"... but you got to realize that we're assuming it's running in monopoly, and monopoly gives no room of improvements at all. Then we end up losing the unprofitable bus routes... whereas with competition, companies will seek ways to gain more customers, and then this problem will be resolved. And the problem is, people in the city are too reliant on cars (still). If the government can do something about it (I don't know, alternate days driving, or toll booths for all cars crossing say south of Eglinton)... If that can force people into taking transit, then privatization would become even more efficient. They are not going to give the employees the same wage anymore. Face it, we're spending too much money on transit personnels... (I know a lot of you guys here are actually transit personnels, so you actually don't want it to privatize as that'll mean a decrease of money)... And they'll get rid of jobs that are completely obsolete and unnecessary. Really? A person to sit at those barrier-free access and collect money? We can cut those off. And no more ticket collectors, all automated. Buy a ticket off a machine and get in the station or simply use the Presto. That's not lowering service in terms of that, but instead, even better (for me at least, not having to deal with nosy collectors at the booths)... And competition is really the key here, it's a regulator that private companies don't cut as many corners as they can to maintain competitive advantages. The government is not going to be doing much either, like they're going to spend $6 billion on the project (they keep pushing the deadlines back...) Well for an adult oneride fare it's a mere $0.25 difference (between YRT and TTC), that's less than 10%.

The only hopes of ever getting fund to do something important, like modernization of the stations (ahem... platform screen doors, and get rid of their marketing Futura-like font, get rid of transfers (at-least give us 2 hours) and implement PRESTO...)... and new subway lines is to privatize... Like I know there's a lot of negative views on privatizing, but you can tell that the level of innovation is higher once it comes to privatization. Like what I mean is, under the government right now we have no funds to go anywhere. In a city of 2.6 million people, we're stuck with 3 subway lines and 1 rapid transit and numerous outdated streetcar lines. This is a shame, and unless you can prove to me that the government can fix this, I'd say privatization is the only way for the funds to come in (and don't really quote Viva on this, cause like someone said before, the system is under York Region, just the operation of the fleets are privatized...) For the Keep TTC Public campaign site, they have York Region in as one of the most expensive fares in Canada, but when you look at the TTC, the fares don't really differ that much, less than a dollar difference (excluding cash fares...)

No one told me about this (and I haven't been on a YRT bus since the last school day which was December 16 for me... and yesterday for the first time when I boarded a YRT bus, they told me about this. Why can't they post this up earlier?