[Toronto] exciting.

Even though these subway cars will be delayed (quel surprise), the only thing I wonder about is business of the continuous subway car.  If I had to guess, there will be much more foot traffic throughout all cars during the trip.  People will go from the front to the back looking for a seat, no?  Could be more dangerous than people quickly sitting or hanging onto a germophobey pole.  Maybe I’m just boobing it up right now.

And good news for the germophobes – the poles now will have an anti-bacterial coating.  Creeps me out a bit, but I’m sure this helps the neurotic in their travels.

Daymaker.

Runnymede station, home of the insane pigeon posse.  Thanks be to Torontoist.

Toronto hikes.

Do you like anagrams?  This image is an anagram.  Learn more about this anagram here.  They did a great job with this!  So it looks like the TTC fare for regular fares, tokens, and Metropasses is going up.  The news media has been going crazy reporting the speculation.  For goodness sakes, it’s 25 cents.  Prices go up.  Your Tim Horton’s coffee, your rent, your paycheque, your cable bill, your subway fare.  Things go up, right?  My main complaint is that now the monthly pass will cost $126.  In Montreal it’s less than half of that, and they have more than 50% of our service.

And now to get Toronto less out of the hole, the city budget officer is considering a municipal sales tax of approximately 1%.  I didn’t know this, but many other large American cities aggressively tax on the municipal level, from taxing bottled water (LIKE IT) and fountain pop to hotel stays.

In closing, sometimes I wish I had a pop fountain in my apartment – I think we can all agree that fountain pop is the absolute best – less sweet, more fizz.  Never underestimate the power of effervescence.

TTC.

[via Toronto Star]

The TTC’s success has helped create a $17.4 million deficit.  Ridership is running at a record high, projected to hit 473 million rides this year, without even a recessionary dent. But revenue per passenger is lower because more people are buying cheaper, transferable Metropasses – at a loss to the fare box of about 3 cents a ride. Sales of discount senior and student fares are up as well.

So your books are millions of dollars short because ridership is up and loyalty is higher through increased monthly passes?  These $105 monthly passes are actually so popular that you’re relying on $2.75 single rides to keep you afloat because $105 isn’t enough money from the the hundreds of thousands of riders?  Really?  $105 a month from hundreds of thousands of people is giving you trouble ?

Montreal’s unlimited monthly pass for students (even university students can get one) is somewhere between $35-$50?  And TTC doesn’t even have a university student rate…. riiiight.  I’ll admit the TTC is better than STM, but $105 for a monthly pass is not a bargain, it’s nearing the maximum that riders would pay for monthly transit.  Guessing their primary cost is wages, as some TTC drivers and ticket-takers are earning over $100K.  Don’t get me wrong – they work hard, they take a lot of crap, and I believe that government is partially responsible for keeping the middle class stabilized.  $100K is not middle class.

And here’s what blogto.com has to say about it, and my stuffy brain agrees:

I smell a fare hike and a broken promise. Or a bunch of other broken promises. The TTC is really short on funds and the transferable Metropass is being singled out as the main cause of lost revenue… which is happening despite record high ridership numbers. How can this happen? They’re building new stations, increasing service, hiring a bunch of new staff, and… selling more Metropasses than ever? What’s worse is that one bloated, unionized city entity is likely to eat up the savings made when another unionized city entity went on strike this summer (and eventually was given wage increases and kept their sick day banking).

Transit porn.

Plans for “Transit City”, by 2040.  Click for the beautiful coverage.