Unlike NYC, the TTC is working fine, so I found a “story” on CityNews (what was wrong with the old CityPulse name — it was cool) last night somewhat funny and depressing at the same time. Seems Fairview Mall up at Don Mills and Sheppard was giving away 5 VIP parking spots near the front entrance. Crack “news” “reporter” Audre Brown interviewed some of the winners. One 60 year old guy in an Oldsmobile said “This is awesome — it probably saved me 1 hour”. Another woman said the VIP spot saved her 2 hours of looking for a spot. These psychopaths must have been using hyperbole, because I can’t believe anybody would spend that much time looking for a spot to park, though the “news” usually does these stories from Yorkdale Mall, and people do complain of similar wait times. The thing is, “reporter” Brown didn’t ask them why they didnt’ take the TTC, even though subways are attached to Fairview (and of course Yorkdale). At the very least, why don’t they park somewhere else and take the subway to the mall? Why would they circle endlessly? And wouldn’t sitting in the car give them lots of time to come to the conclusion to use the subway? At the very least, they’d pass the station and see all the people walking quickly inside.
It’s one of those moments where the divide between people who “get” how a city works, and those who don’t, is evident. It’s like the Red and Blue states down south. Sure, sometimes you buy too many things or things that are too big to carry onto the subway, but not all the time. The good part of all this, smog notwithstanding, is that there is a large chunk of the very, very dumb sitting alone in their cars, away from the rest of us. I’m temped to organize a big walk through mall parking lots over this week, calling it something like “The Dummy Zoo”. We could hand out TTC maps or at least make fun of people. Actually, we shouldn’t do that, the TTC should hire students to do it (maybe not the making fun part).