What kind of impact do you think tomorrow’s “strike” will have on the decision to raise fares? Let everyone know by voting in the poll below. While you’re at it, use the comments on this post to elaborate on your vote!
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3 Comments
The strike will not affect people, one newspaper article said that the group had 2000, half that and for people participating (you always half an attendance list for FREE “events”).
Brian, here is a crazy idea. Sit down if you are standing, put down the coffee, stop eating if you are………………………..
Approach Councilors Giambrone, Mihevc, Augimeri, Bussin, Hall, Milczyn, Moeser, Perruzza or Saundercook. Just bring a knight’s armor. You know because they will turn to a giant lizard and eat you up, they will grab your head and rip it out, you know because the councilors that run the TTC are monsters.
Seriously, either than Augimeri, I have approached all of them and they are friendly. The thing is many people would go to let’s say Giambrone and go :why the blank blank blank is my bus route so late, what the f^^^?…Go up to them, show some respect and you will see how things go well.
The problem is that the TTC is *not* an optional service for most folks, so even if they manage to take extraordinary means to avoid the TTC tomorrow, nobody within the commission is actually going to realistically expect that this would represent actual reduced ridership in the long term. It will be seen simply for the stunt that it is.
Personally, the fare hike itself doesn’t really bother me. It takes money to run the TTC and while we all love to complain about various deficiencies in the service, the reality is that you’ll find the same type of complaints in just about any city. I have been to cities with far less sophisticated transit systems that charge higher fares. For example, in Ottawa fares start at $3 and have for the past several years, with wider fare zones costing $4 and $5 respectively. Now, OC Transpo does seem to have a more satisfied customer base than the TTC, but you can’t realistically tell me that it costs less to run the TTC (with 10 times the ridership and an actual subway system) than it does to run the Ottawa Transit system.
That said, the part about the fare hikes that I find particularly annoying is the inconvenience of restricted token sales. Basically, we not only have to deal with a fare increase, but for weeks prior to the fare increase the token vending machines and automated entrances to the subway stations become virtually useless and we have to either endure ridiculously long lines at collector booths or worry about having exact subway fare with us all of the time.
“For example, in Ottawa fares start at $3″
Only cash fares — a trip in Ottawa (with a two-hour time-based transfer, so a RETURN trip, often) costs two tickets, and tickets are $1.15 ea. So a trip in Ottawa is $1.15 to $2.30 depending on whether or not you can fit your return trip into the transfer window.