TTC CEO Andy Byford’s Youtube apology for subway service fiascos on March 18 stirred a lot of interest, along with an interview on CBC’s Metro Morning. This will no doubt continue at a town hall meeting tonight (which I cannot attend due to scheduling conflicts).
Monday afternoon’s peak was not a good one for TTC subway service:
- 5:16 Trains holding for smoke at track level at Eglinton Station (cleared 5:31)
- 5:25 Trains holding for smoke at track level at Keele Station (cleared 5:33)
- 5:58 Power cut at Dupont halting service from St. George to St. Clair West. Train doors opened in the tunnel. 24 minute delay
The times shown for the smoke delays are from timestamps on TTC e-Alerts, and the actual duration of the delay was probably longer. We know from Byford’s comments that there were a few passenger assistance alarms from people requiring medical assistance, but these never showed up as official alerts to riders.
The TTC’s daily measurement of service punctuality for the Yonge line fell to 93%, below the target of 96%. This is an all-day average of performance at many places on the line, and it takes a big upheaval in service to make a dent in the considerable amount of more-or-less punctual service rating for the line as a whole. The index has never been known to fall below 90%.
The delays were only part of the regular menu of service disruptions including mechanical failures of trains, track and signal problems, weather, security incidents, not to mention suicides. Running a well-behaved service can be quite challenging. One of those challenges is to simply keep people informed about what is going on when multiple delays interact to foul up service, and info about what is left running changes from moment to moment.
Seeing Andy Byford there on YouTube with his mea culpa is a nice touch, but there is a limit to how many of these the TTC can issue before riders simply say “oh no, not again”. The TTC’s new Customer Charter commits the organization to improvement, but the message coming through loud and clear at public meetings is “show me”.
Monday’s events highlight some obvious issues for managing complex events, but they also raise questions about how much we can reasonably expect of the transit system.
The incident with the doors opening on a train between stations was a matter of human error by the Guard who inexplicably opened them when the train was stopped north of Dupont Station at a red signal. Automatic Train Control could have prevented this, but that’s years away and, fortunately, this sort of incident is extremely rare. The TRs will only open their doors when the train is stopped, and indeed the sensing associated with this feature is part of the extra delay time when trains arrive at stations.
Updated Mar 21:
There has been another incident of train staff accidentally opening doors in the tunnel as reported today by the CBC.
Any incident like this, and including fires or smoke, requires a power cut and affects service in both directions, whereas an ill passenger, most of the time, holds up service only one way for a brief time while they are assisted off of the train.
However, there are a lot of incidents, and each of them adds to discontent among the affected riders. Even if someone only encounters a major delay once or twice a month, that’s the experience they remember and tell their friends about. What’s more, if the system cannot get through the rush hour without, simply as a matter of probabilities, having a few non-trivial delays, this compromises the TTC’s ability to achieve its planned capacity.
A few years ago, the TTC had an independent review by UK-based transport consultants who found that, generally speaking, the TTC subway wasn’t all that bad for systems of comparable age and technology. However, the consultants warned that hoped for increase in capacity required more reliability in trains and infrastructure, fewer incidents of passenger illness caused by crowding, and a general attention to running as tight an operation as possible. Some delays are inevitable, and for them the issues are incident management, good communications with passengers, provision of alternate service if possible, and quick recovery of full subway capacity.
When we talk about how close the TTC might be to running out of capacity, optimists love to quote the highest possible figures — automated trains running on the closest headways, passengers flowing quickly to and from trains to minimize dwell times, equipment with superb reliability, and a magic world in which nothing ever goes wrong. That’s not how the subway actually operates, and Byford’s task is to expunge every source of “controllable delay” from the system.
On Metro Morning, Byford made a passing remark about improving terminal operations and getting trains out promptly. That’s an important change, one that is essential to maximizing the trains/hour actually operated and maintaining good service spacing.
Getting the subway to work as well as it possibly can is an important start, but it’s only part of the job. We will probably never see YouTube apologies for the large gaps in service on surface routes, but instead will have small tutorials on why short-turns are required. Sadly, “TTC Culture” still includes too strong a sense that most of the problems are external and this must change.
A target of 65% for “punctual service”, itself based on a generous 6-minute-wide margin for service relative to scheduled headway, accepts that the odds are better than half that a rider will encounter a significant gap at least once a day, probably more if they take multiple trips. What we don’t see is a measure of how well or poorly passenger loads are distributed among buses and streetcars, and what the riders see rather than what the hourly or daily averages report.
If transit really is going to attract more riders, especially those facing longer trips, reliability is key. To some, the solution is a network of subways, but that simply won’t happen thanks to cost and the time needed to build them. Some new rapid transit capacity is overdue, but it must be placed where it will do the most good, not as pet projects of particularly noisy and influential members of Council.
Meanwhile, the TTC must address service quality on that vast part of the network not served by subways, and Andy Byford must be just as prepared to take responsibility for the Finch and Dufferin buses and the Queen streetcar as he is for the Yonge subway.
Steve Munro 
Will all due respect, I’m sorry, Steve, but the people who are expecting TTC to be 65% to a 100% punctual need a reality check.
A train is late or delayed because of the factors mentioned by you, not because the TTC wants to be late. The people who whine about delays must think that nothing happens or must happen, and act as if TTC drivers are their personal slaves to simply get there at their whim-except that they aren’t, and if something happens to the train, it happens, and the TTC must deal with it-there’s no getting around that fact. The people who expect this are, to be frank, quite spoiled by what we have here in Toronto-I wonder what they would expect if they were living in a Third World nation where public transit isn’t as effective as it is in Toronto. Also, they were going home when all of these incidents occurred-what’s their hellish hurry? To get back home to watch Friends or American Idol?
As well, I don’t want this or any other incident to be used as an excuse to destroy people’s jobs in driving subway trains/streetcars/light rail simply because people believe that getting home at 5:00 PM or going elsewhere is so super-important that nothing must delay them in doing so. The excuse will come up that these people worked long hard hours and deserve to be home quicker, but the TTC driver that’s taking them back home work just as hard to get them there, and deserve a lot more consideration that what they’re usually given by most riders. I don’t trust the full automation of the YUS or the BDL completely for this reason (and I also don’t support the demonization of the unions just to have this happen; a human being has to have worth and be able to work in order to be a human being, and completely automating the subway and the rest of the TTC will destroy people”s self-worth.)
I’ll close by saying (again) that I hope people can understand that things happen and they have to be dealt with, and I’ll also close by including this story about automation and how it can get out of hand.
Steve: I have no interest in demonizing the unions. In all of my analyses and commentaries on TTC surface service, my aim has been to establish (a) just how bad (or even good on occasion) it is and (b) what the most common controllable causes of problems are. These include schedules that don’t match reality, but also include a laissez-faire attitude to headway management that is a direct cause of erratic service and crowding.
The TTC 65% target refers to surface bus routes (it’s 70% on average for streetcars). For subways it is much higher, but is measured in a different way that makes it very hard for service to get a seriously bad rating. There is a problem with both metrics because they institutionalize the way things have always been done rather than offering incentives to improve.
My reference to automation was not intended to suggest that it would fix everything. In fact it won’t as almost all of the problems relate to factors that have nothing to do with actual train operation. I mentioned it only because an automated system would “know” it wasn’t in a station and, at the very least, require some sort of special override to open doors in the tunnel. However, I know of only a handful of events of this type in the decades I have been watching the TTC, and there are many other problems the TTC should address that have nothing to do with ATC.
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I’m ready to take the official and direct apology from Andy Byford in the spirit in which it was given, but I fully agree with your point that he cannot just focus on “one-time crap” on the subway and ignore or gloss over all the “day-to-day crap” riders on the subways, streetcars and buses are dealing with.
The big question for me is what will he do now? Will he use this series of incidents as a “line in the sand” and deal with “TTC Culture” (as well as TTC passenger ‘culture’) and improve from the ‘state of good repair’ to ‘state of quality service’ or will he let it go and allow the TTC to continue the slide backwards as the physical plant ages?
You know what I would want to see as evidence of a commitment to a better future?
1. Paying more attention to the service data and analysis of the data (what Steve is doing here, for free) and;
2. Recognizing that good, quality transit is the foundation on which to build customer service improvements.
Cheers, Moaz
Ps. In Byford’s favour I recall that back in 2007 I was stuck twice in the same week on the Kelana Jaya line in Kuala Lumpur … for more than an hour each time (once in a tunnel and once on the elevated portion of the line … in 35 degree heat and 100% humidity) and Rein Westra (then CEO of RapidKL) never made a public apology or even put an ad in the newspaper.
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Speaking of the vast network outside the Yonge subway, will we be hearing an apology tomorrow for today’s downed wires on Queen and “emergency track repairs” on Gerrard?
Steve: The overhead problem was caused by a garbage truck (a private sector one at that if the photo is to be believed). I have not hear the details of the Gerrard repair which could be a spring pavement heave. The track there is fairly recent.
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Perhaps the TTC should consider operating more surface service along rapid transit routes, especially during rush hour. Being able to catch a frequent bus on Yonge or Bloor may not only help to cushion the blow if an incident occurs, but could reduce subway demand for those going a short distance.
Steve: The maximum practical capacity of a bus service running on Yonge Street would be about 30 vehicles per hour, and that translates to under 2,000 passengers. Nothing can replace the loss of the subway.
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I hate to say it, but my first thought watching the video was “They didn’t close a whole platform at Bloor so that he could shoot his video, did they?”
Steve: It was shot at the south end of the northbound platform where there is almost no pedestrian traffic.
In larger networks, there are often alternate routes to take in the event of a disruption. (London has permanent, line-by-line service advisory boards at all stations for this very reason.) In Toronto, your alternate is often a surface route. Those routes won’t ever be able to absorb the full spill-over from a subway outage, but with surface route reliability standards so much lower most people probably don’t even consider them as viable alternates.
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A network is essentially the answer, the DRL would have helped move people around and route around some of these issues … but I think more importantly, the CEO getting out and saying “the system didn’t work as expected” is a good way to get the problems with the system in front of those that don’t necessarily use it all that often … part of the challenge with new taxes will be selling them to the public, and being able to say – look these new lines will be more reliable than the current ones, they will give us more options to redirect people, and you’ll hear from me less on your drive home – there are major problems with the current system that will require money to fix.
Fires on tracks should be talked about every single time they happen, same with suicides and other track incursions … there is a fix, platform doors … it costs money, it can’t happen for a few years, but we can get a plan and funds … if people think about it long enough maybe they will be willing to pay for it … in this case, all three delays – almost a full hour would be resolved with ATC and platform doors. If we can’t put them on the whole system, maybe just at the stations that cause the most havoc.
Steve: Actually, if you look at the TTC’s e-Alerts, you will see that the fires occur all over the place including at open air stations. From personal experience I remain unconvinced that platform doors are “the answer” because every case I have encountered of “smoke” smells seem to have been from overheated equipment on a train (sometimes this can be worsened by accumulated dirt), not from a newspaper fire. For a time, a faction within TTC management was pushing PEDs as a nice new, big ticket motherhood project that would soak up $1b (I am not kidding) while they were not actually building any new lines.
Moreover, the TTC said “we have a problem with litter” and instituted a big cleanup campaign (which I assume still continues as I don’t see as much litter as before, nor is what I do see as long-lived). I am not sure there has been much change in the incidence of “smoke at track level”. We need a much better understanding of just what is going on here before buying into a very expensive “solution” that may not fix the problem. BTW, there are no plans to add ATC to the BD line, only to replace the existing elderly signal system.
I hope next time there is a massive surface delay he apologizes as well – and then we can discuss transit right of ways, priority, street design, service levels, snow clearing, parades, construction.
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It is encouraging that Byford specifically mentioned the need to improve service reliability and punctuality in his video, although the Metro Morning interview seemed to focus primarily on customer information rather than service quality. Hopefully the focus on reliability and punctuality does not just focus on the subway (which generally operates at a very good level, notwithstanding that events, when they occur, impact a large number of passengers because of a train’s larger capacity and because extended delays can block a series of subsequent trains).
On that note, I am curious to know whether you have met with Byford to discuss your route analyses, other observations about service irregularities, or other aspects of TTC “culture” that impair service quality and that could (presumably) be easily addressed (e.g., non-functioning transit priority detectors; order to stop before facing point switches, etc.). He does seem intent on turning the TTC “culture” around, although the most visible initiatives seem to be somewhat unrelated to the actual service (e.g., cleanliness of facilities, customer information, etc.).
Further to George Bell’s comment, a network is the answer (and here we are talking in particular about the DRL, although could also refer to Eglinton or even improved surface routes) in part because it offers alternative travel choices for the thousands of passengers that may be impacted by a disruption, but also because it means that the Y-U-S (and B-D, for that matter) do not have to be pushed to their absolute limits without any slack to accommodate minor disruptions (or even fluctuations).
Steve: I have chatted with Andy Byford, but much more regularly with Chris Upfold who is involved in work that attempts to improve how service is monitored and measured.
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I’ve seen you mention that you aren’t convinced about the platform doors a number of times…there seem to be a number of studies showing that they are quite effective (69% less delays, 75% less deaths seem to be the numbers most quoted):
Taipei Rapid Transit Corporation
Railway Technical Web
That second document also shows that there are a number of levels of protection (full wall, half wall, gates, barriers … even some that work without ATC).
Again, I don’t think they need them at every station, only where the statistics show there are problems, and I think only once ATC is in place … at the least plan to do a station or two and see what the improvement is.
Steve: If you follow the TTC’s alerts for service problems, you will see that they are distributed around the system, not at a few “hot spots”. In the case of suicides, Toronto already has experience with attempts at prevention with the barrier on the Prince Edward Viaduct. The suicide rate has not declined since this was installed because people have just gone elsewhere. As for delays caused by smoke or fires, I am still unconvinced that garbage fires are the only cause, possibly not even the primary one. I plan to ask the TTC if they have stats showing a reduction in incidents after their cleanup campaign for track level garbage.
The Hong Kong information cited in your second link says that suicide attempts did not move in response to installation of doors. That needs some context such as how extensive the installation in the network as a whole and what the distribution of events was in the “before” configuration.
Both links you cite speak of platform doors only as a safety measure together with track intrusion detection systems, not as a fire reduction scheme.
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While I understand that many delays on the TTC are caused by “stuff” outside their control I think that part of the problem is that the TTC then ‘pretend’ that the problem does not even exist. This seems to show in your various route analyses where (surprise) it takes longer to drive a surface route in rush hour than at midnight but the ‘scheduled time’ remains the same. Clearly this results in surface transit running late in rush-hours and then to short-turns — and inconvenienced or turned-off customers.
The 504 King route is (another) good example. There is a lot of (new) demand from and to King West and due to traffic, loading time etc. the service is often slow. This leads to lots of complaints about full or slow streetcars. The answer, short-turn eastbound cars at Church or Parliament so that more can operate on the western part of the route. The result: customers east of Church — where the population is also increasing — get a far worse service. One answer in the TTC’s control would be adding additional streetcars but the old excuse was that there as a shortage of streetcars. However, (at least for the next few months) that should not apply with the Spadina line only going to King and the Queen’s Quay line completely run by buses.
Enough has been said (and little done!) about reducing parking on streets at rush-hours and adjusting traffic light timing to speed traffic but there are other other improvements that would benefit ALL road users. Several years ago the City experimented with yellow “boxes” at some main road junctions to remind drivers they should not enter the junction if they can’t also leave it. One such junction was King and Jarvis which is frequently blocked at rush hours. The lines are still there but very faded and a while ago the local neighbourhood association (SLNA) asked the City to repaint them. Answer: ‘This was an experimental program that did not work due to lack of enforcement.’
Clearly the City needs to ensure the traffic flows properly (for everyone’s benefit) and if the police have no time (or interest) then maybe the City should ask the Province to give the parking control officers the authority to enforce at least some moving offenses. (As those in the UK and many US cities can.)
If the TTC accepted that most problems have solutions (and some ARE outside their powers to effect) they should be pressing for these to be implemented and pointing them out to those who can change laws, rules and minds.
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Never understood why the TTC has never purchased a vacuum train to deal with track-level debris, a vehicle such as this one.
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He refers to “fire” not “smoke”. Is this a change in TTC terminology?
Steve: The incidents are commonly described in TTC alerts as “smoke at track level”. Toronto Fire must be called for all such incidents whether there is an actual fire or not.
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The only long term solution to these problems is to build a larger network to provide redunancy, e.g. the Eglinton light rail, and to build a subway along Don Mills Road to relieve the Yonge line, and electrifying Lakeshore GO. However, these sorts of incidents happen with other methods of transportation as well – closures of one of the major highways due to accidents/construction/police investigations/special events/falling chunks of concrete etc. is probably a more common occurrence than delays on the subway.
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It was certain a nice touch that Byford made the point of a public Youtube apology, though clearly if nothing changes then it only seems a hollow gesture. Byford says he ride the TTC, so he would see first hand how the system is operating. Although I now tend to bike more often than I take transit, I still ride it often enough to appreciate that on the whole the TTC does still operate well (indeed much better than one might expect given the level of support it gets) and also that delays will happen.
What is often frustrating is that only when I have deposited my token and am on the platform do I find out there is a delay to service – had I known, I would have taken another route. I was encouraged to hear there were plans to have some kind of alerts such that someone entering a subway station would know before going through the turnstile that service was not running. In one case where someone told me northbound service on the Yonge line was not running, I boarded an eastbound Dundas car to Broadview instead (I was going to be going eastbound on the Bloor line).
Phil
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I’m perplexed. From the photos snapped by passengers, it’s obvious people on board knew the subway train doors had opened in a tunnel. Do the Guards have no window in their booths, and is this why they twice opened doors onto a tunnel rather than a station? (And there are also those automated announcements – “now entering xx station”. ) What’s the story here?
Steve: The guard on Yonge trains rides in the last car. It is possible for this car to be on the platform, but most of the train to be in the tunnel beyond. Alternately, it could just be a mistake — pressing the wrong button — but happening twice in a week is quite a co-incidence.
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It’s funny — while waiting for operators to change over earlier this afternoon I overheard them compare Andy Byford to David Gunn and stated how happy they are with him. Apparently there was some sort of TTC function at the Old Mill recently and Andy came over to the operator’s table to introduce himself to him and his family. The operator went on to say that they were appreciative of the job he was doing and were very happy with him as CEO.
Having lived through both of their reigns as CEO and CGM respectively I can see the resemblance in terms of the way they prefer to run things.
The best thing to happen to the TTC in the 1990s was David Gunn and the best thing to happen since then is Andy Byford. The way I look at it, they are both no-nonsense individuals focused on repairing past wrongs and improving things as opposed to holding the status quo. The employees seem to like him as well.
All I can say is Andy Byford is doing an amazing job and it shows. The simple fact is how many other former CGMs and now CEOs have worked this hard to improve the system and been so customer service oriented. [Steve says: I presume you mean to say “how few other …”]
As a sidenote, my father worked as an operator under Gunn and now under Byford and compares the two with great esteem. Andy Byford is the best thing to happen to the TTC in a very long time and has earned a great admiration from the frontline staff at the TTC.
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I’m perplexed. From the photos snapped by passengers, it’s obvious people on board knew the subway train doors had opened in a tunnel. Do the Guards have no window in their booths, and is this why they twice opened doors onto a tunnel rather than a station? (And there are also those automated announcements – “now entering xx station”. ) What’s the story here?
To add to that question, did all the doors open in every car?
But if the Guard is in the last car, it doesn’t make sense why the Guard would open the doors when (part of) the train is in the tunnel.
Steve: If the train is leaving a station, the guard is in the last car to leave.
I could see this happen in the old days when the Guard was not in the last car … if a train stopped short with the last car(s) in the tunnel and the Guard might open all the doors without checking the position of the train (eg. not looking down the platform or looking for the wall guide) … but I don’t remember this happening in the past.
Since it happened twice in such a short time … and there appear to be no mechanical or technical reasons … could it be that the same Guard made the same mistake twice?
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: I doubt it was the same guard twice. I am waiting until I next see some folks from the TTC to find out if they have any more info on this.
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In response to Neville Ross who wrote
Clearly you do not have children who need to be picked up from daycare or the babysitters and have to pay extra if you are late getting to pick them up! You also apparently do not have after work activities or dinner to prepare or any post-work responsibilities whatsoever!!
And we DON’T live in the Third World that’s why we expect better service!!
Steve: I was wondering when someone was going to give Neville Ross a dressing down on this.
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In my past job working in the non-profit sector, if my target was only 65% success, I’d be asked serious questions. The questions wouldn’t be about the success not occurring. No, I’d be asked about the rating system itself. In essence, I’d be expected to figure out how to change the rating approach to have it meet what the province and the feds preferred – a 95% or higher score.
I’m surprised that somebody hasn’t been bugging the TTC to at least figure out how to get a publicly better sounding success rate. 65% is bad optics.
Steve: It may be bad optics, but as I have demonstrated in my analyses, that’s what the TTC achieves. The real problem lies in the subway where the scoring systems make it appear as if service is immensely more reliable, when this is more due to the physical inability of a parade of trains to close up the way surface buses or streetcars would into packs of two or three.
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I know … which makes things stranger. The Guard wouldn’t intentionally open the door when his car was still in the station (and presumably moving out of the station) … which makes it sound like a huge mistake … but there would have to be some kind of lockout mechanism.
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: On the TR’s, the lockout depends on the train being in motion. In any event, more details are needed to understand what is happening.
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To the first commenter:
Often I am not going home during the afternoon rush hour … and in fact sometimes I am going TO work.
Lots of times I’m going to a night class or to my night job.
Just because you don’t give a crap about getting home (or wherever) in a timely manner doesn’t mean others don’t, or HAVE TO. (eg if I am late for too many shifts I’ll get fired – I can’t add a 30-60 minute cushion to my daily schedule JUST IN CASE transit screws up)
And like the other poster said, sometimes I’m picking up my kids or taking them to swimming, karate, etc.
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So what would it take to get the TTC to push streetcars out of their origin points on consistent headways? You’ve documented quite well that “bunching” is starting right at the origination of several of the streetcar routes — which is absolutely ridiculous, of course.
Does this (speculating wildly) require changes to the operating practices: perhaps something to make sure that operators arrive a little bit ahead of when their streetcar is scheduled to depart, and have a little bit of extra time at the end of their schedule, so that operators will continue to operate on scheduled hours when streetcar departures on headway are all delayed by (say) 2 minutes from planned schedule?
Steve: It does not seem to matter what the schedule says, but what is needed is the will to actually manage the service proactively rather than reacting after problems develop. It also requires wrestling with the culture that accepts bunched service as being “punctual” for the purpose of reporting on performance. The TTC has a long history of blaming all of its problems on external causes, and that is a deeply rooted behaviour. Without question there are difficulties of operating in traffic, but even on routes where they have an exclusive right-of-way, we see the same erratic service.
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Steve: perhaps you didn’t understand the point of my comment. My point was that the way the employee contracts are written, and the way the *employees*’ lives are scheduled, probably encourage the *employees* to continue bunching.
As in, for all I know — I’m speculating — it’s quite possible that right now, assuming I’m an operator, that
(a) if I show up a minute late to my shift due to traffic, then my streetcar goes out late
(b) if the previous guy goes out late, but I go out “on time” (rather than on headway) I get my lunch break and go home when I’m “supposed to”. But if I go out on headway I get my lunch break late and go home late.
I’m not sure whether you’ve ever looked into the employee side of stuff there; if you have, I haven’t noticed it on your blog. It’s possible that the way the employee shifts are organized are creating incentives for the operators to NOT operate to headway.
This would require changing the management culture, obviously, still.
Steve: There are certainly cases where cars go out late, but this only affects the onset of the two peak periods, and to a much lesser extent other service. This can happen because an operator is a tad late showing up, but just as likely because the run in question is not crewed and is filled at the last minute by someone on a volunteer basis or from the spare board. It could also be a problem with finding a working car in the yard. All of these are fixed typically on the first trip with the out of place car being short turned.
The TTC claims its target is relative to headway, but operators get hassled for running more than three minutes off of schedule which is not the same thing. That said, there is little explanation for two or three vehicles sitting at a terminal, taking long layovers, and then leaving together and running as a pack to the other end of the line. That’s got nothing to do with the contract, and everything to do with a lack of line management and a “culture” that says this sort of thing is acceptable. For lines with short headways like Dufferin, the TTC’s measurement scheme does not penalize bunching but considers it to be within acceptable levels of punctuality.
As for employee shifts, the contract includes fairly steep penalties for the TTC for operators not getting off work on time. This was a direct result of operators regularly having to work well beyond their scheduled end times on shifts which are already over the sort of 7 or 8 hour day most of us are used to. In the subway, which has a very hard time actually running to the printed schedule, this problem is solved by having operators swap trains to get them back on time. That tactic is not available for surface routes, and short turns are the result.
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You know, when a company does not appear to be considerate of people’s needs (whether customers or staff) morale and public support drop quickly.
When the company shows a consistent pattern of not putting people first, it becomes clear that they have not learned from their mistakes.
Byford has to deal with a public and TTC employees who have lost faith in the TTC as an organization that sees them as a priority … and it looks like he is trying.
Metrolinx, on the other hand, has had to be reminded multiple times and still appears to not “get it” when it comes to being a good neighbour … as this story from Weston shows.
They’re going to look into putting in a cleaning station now, months after the project began.
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: GO Transit has been a very bad neighbour all along the line through the “Georgetown South” project, both in Weston and in West Toronto.
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Maybe it’s just coincidence, but I’ve been noticing a pattern at Yonge and Queen, where two or three westbound streetcars with different endpoints (McCaul, Humber, Long Branch) will arrive practically in a bunch. It kind of seems planned.
If a McCaul car is first, it slows down the whole pack as people start to get on, get told it’s only going as far as McCaul, then move back to the sidewalk to wait for one of the following streetcars.
If a Long Branch car is first, almost everyone tries to get onto that car, even though I suspect not all of them need to get to Long Branch. The following Humber car then runs relatively empty, but the long dwell times on the Long Branch car keeps the Humber car bunched with the Long Branch car.
What is the point of this bunching?
Steve: You expect there is a point to this as if there is some grand design behind poor service.
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It seems like changing *this* should be job one. This behavior sends a clear signal from management to operators that headways don’t matter.
If it’s made clear that the management is actually interested in headway maintenance (*not* schedule adherence) on frequent-service lines, perhaps the operators will stop doing stuff like this:
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Why not? Shortage of reporting-for-duty locations? There’s nothing intrinsically different about a subway route and a surface route in this regard.
Steve: The changeover point has to be selected so that it is reasonably safe, and so that the swap puts the operator in more or less the right place. Depending on the degree of lateness in the route as a whole, this will vary. In the subway, it’s a question of choosing the appropriate station, but out on the street it’s a lot harder for two ops to just change cars on the fly. There are some scheduled instances of this, but the TTC and ATU would like to minimize them. Adding this as a standard practice is not an option. Of course, for buses, changing vehicles on the fly is even more complex given that they are not adjacent to each other in the middle of the road.
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To expand on my comment, I don’t expect “operator swapping” to be possible on all bus routes, but on high-frequency streetcar routes, I don’t see what would prevent it.
Steve: See my remarks above.
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@Paula: I understand that you have kids, I just don’t like the way the TTC ‘s being regarded or treated. The drivers/employees deserve a lot more respect than what they get for the job that they do, and the comments made at most places on the ‘Net are just pissing me off, especially considering that most of the people who make said comments most likely voted in the leaders who cut the TTC’s budgets and don’t do a thing to restore said funding back to what it used to be or to even lower the fares.
Steve: I am fascinated by the comment threads on some of the mainstream sites where it is clear the “no new taxes” brigade is out in full force. There is a deep distrust that politicians will build what they promise or do anything useful with new revenues.
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I suspect that a large number of people posting on those public comment threads do so for pay or during their spare time in between official events.
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Steve, I have deliberately kept my comments to myself on this topic. It has reached the point where I can no longer do so! There is a lot of misinformation being discussed here — you have to be an “insider” (front line employee) to understand the issues being discussed!
First: Richard White. While there are many comparisons of Andy Byford to David Gunn — Andy is NOT David! While I did not work under David Gunn (I started with Rick Ducharme and later Gary Webster), I have heard many stories about David Gunn. Andy Byford’s focus is “appeasing” the public, while David Gunn focused on the actual running of the system day to day — his famous “state of good repair”. David Gunn did a massive management shake up and fired a lot of middle managers. Andy Byford has “fired” some mid to upper managers.
As an Operator, I feel that Byford needs to institute a massive cultural change in the “Service Planning Department”! This department continues to cling to 25-30 year old schedules. What is needed is a change to the way scheduling is handled. Why am I given the same running time at 5:30 am as I am given at 8:00 am? At 5:30 am, I have to crawl at 35-40kph and kill lights while at 8:00am I have to try to “push” every amber and drive at the speed limit and still not be able to keep to schedule! Andy Byford can showcase all the new Subway Trains, Streetcars, Articulated Buses, fancy new uniforms, etc. all he wants, but until he tackles the fundamental issues such as scheduling, he will never be like David Gunn! He is an improvement over Ducharme (and Webster to a lesser degree) but he still has a long way to go to fill Gunn’s shoes!
To respond to Nathanael: Operators who “show up late” are marked as a “miss” and are disciplined (which can lead to being “relieved of duty”) — this is an extremely serious infraction! The biggest problem with vehicles entering service late is lack of vehicles — I am currently doing a crew where, due to lack of vehicles, I am routinely 5-10 minutes late leaving the garage! For the record, I normally arrive at work at least 20 minutes before my “report” time to allow me to complete my paperwork and conduct the full circle check/air brake check of the vehicle prior to entering service! I get to stand around and wait until past my “scheduled departure time” before the equipment dept. gets a bus (from a returning night bus) refueled and cleaned to be assigned to me!
And don’t even get me started on the “street changeover” topic!! My blood is likely to start boiling!
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@Neville You understand that I have kids, that’s great. Do you also understand that people who get annoyed when their commute is lengthened by 20-30 minutes *on a regular basis* get frustrated? Frustrated to be late picking up the kids, making dinner, going to activities, doing homework, etc… or even if they are just going home to watch TV?
“Extraordinary” circumstances aside, why does it take 15-20 minutes to get NB from York Mills to Finch every day? Ridiculous!
Steve: A common problem on the subway is that there are, oddly enough, too many trains on the line at times and they get backed up at terminals. The same thing happens on the BD line at Kennedy and at Kipling. The TTC schedules trains for the maximum period of the rush hour, and most of the time they don’t need all of this unless there is some sort of delay. Even if they are sorting things out, there is a limit to how quickly they can turn trains around, and it is possible for a queue of trains to arrive at a terminal faster than they can leave.
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That is ironic and odd, so much so that the passengers downtown who cannot squeeze into the 1st or 2nd Subway train would hardly believe this.
The TTC is going to have to make improvements (crewing procedures and crossover cycles) at terminal stations to speed up the layover time … but of course there will be a maximum efficiency they can reach.
How much of an improvement can be found by having crews on the B-D line stay in the first and last cars as they are now doing on the Y-U-S line?
That is the only ‘improvement’ that I can think of that won’t cost any money in additional crews or construction.
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: What is needed much more is step back crewing so that crews get a break between trips at the terminals. The physical layout can be a problem because, for example, the loo may not be a short walk from every part of the train.
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I remember riding in the 90’s, and the H-4s-H6s would regularly overshoot their stops and front doors would open in the tunnel. No biggie at the time.
And of course the Operator would often ‘drive’ with the door open. Sometimes talking to passengers (one time, the Operator talked extensively with a passenger on the ins and outs of the TTC.. ie. all the blue lights are 500 feet apart, takes about 22 minutes from Kennedy to Yonge), other times, chatting it up with other operators, like they were just hanging out at a buddy’s place.
Gone are the days when riding the TTC was relaxed and fun. Now, it is just way too strict, everybody’s uptight, operators are cranky, and just everything is over controlled.
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I remember those days, too and wish to note that what people are demanding above is exactly (IMHO) why things are so strict, why everybody’s so uptight, why operators are cranky, and why everything’s so over-controlled.
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