GIAMBRONE
• Miller champions Giambrone and TTC plan [ Toronto Star ]
• Miller tweets as sex scandal simmers [ Toronto Sun ]
• Mayor defends council protege Giambrone [ National Post ]
• Giambrone still leads TTC – for now [ Toronto Star ]
• Giambrone’s got their vote [ Toronto Sun ]
• Miller not ribbing Adam [ Toronto Sun ]
• Giambrone has ‘Net all a-Twitter [ Toronto Sun ]
• It’s about poor judgment [ National Post ]
• Giambrone unlikely to run for his council seat [ Globe & Mail ]
• More people at City Hall ‘need sex,’ Toronto councillor suggests [ National Post ]
TTC
• TTC lone bright spot for city’s bottom line [ Globe & Mail ]
• Now TTC is a hot button issue [ Toronto Sun ]
• `The TTC is a real mess’ [ Toronto Star ]
• Hume: Transit ills are taking back seat to scandal [ Toronto Star ]
PAN AM GAMES
• Pan Am boss a businessman and a jock [ Toronto Sun ]
• Businessman chosen to head Pan Am Games [ Toronto Star ]
• Seasoned executive takes lead of Pan Am Games [ Globe & Mail ]
OTHER NEWS
• Bicycle thief Kenk’s assault charges stayed [ National Post ]
• Raising the Allen to shoe level [ National Post ]
• And Canada’s artsiest city is …[ National Post ]
• Twitter fans pitch vision for Toronto – succinctly [ Toronto Star ]
• Historic shift from loo to log house [ Toronto Star ]
• Racial profiling still has no place here [ Toronto Star ]
• Zoologist urges council to end zoo’s elephant program [ Globe & Mail ]
• No snow is good snow for city coffers [ Globe & Mail ]
15 comments
Want to have your say on the TTC?
Wednesday, February 17, 2010 at 1:00 PM… The nine politicians (well, maybe 8… Adam fled to France for a vacation) will meet – Committee Room 1, 2nd Floor, Toronto City Hall, 100 Queen Street West
Agenda is here: http://www3.ttc.ca/About_the_TTC/Commission_reports_and_information/Commission_meetings/2010/Feb_17_2010/Agenda/index.jsp
Members of the public may make deputations:
Public presentations will be heard at 2:00 p.m. Requests to speak must be registered in writing by 12:00 Noon of day preceding meeting day.
If you would like to appear before the Commission, contact the Coordinator – Secretariat Services who is responsible for coordinating the meeting process. You can do this by sending an e-mail to gso@ttc.ca
9 TORONTO TRANSIT COMMISSION MEMBERS:
Chair Adam Giambrone Vice-Chair Joe Mihevc Commissioner Maria Augimeri Commissioner Sandra Bussin Commissioner Suzan Hall Commissioner Peter Milczyn Commissioner Ron Moeser Commissioner Anthony Perruzza Commissioner Bill Saundercook
So whatever your take on the TTC, don’t just post complaints on blogs and here… Tell those who have the power to make change.
Oh… and if you can’t be at the meeting, here are email contacts for the commissioners:
Joe Mihevc (vice-chair): councillor_mihevc@toronto.ca
Maria Augimeri: councillor_augimeri@toronto.ca
Sandra Bussin: councillor_bussin@toronto.ca
Suzan Hall: councillor_hall@toronto.ca
Peter Milczyn: councillor_milczyn@toronto.ca
Ron Moeser: councillor_moeser@toronto.ca
Anthony Perruzza: councillor_perruzza@toronto.ca
Bill Saundercook: councillor_saundercook@toronto.ca
The TTC does just have an image problem. As a system it actually runs quite well. A subway coming every 5 minutes is unheard of in New York, a city to which Torontonians are fond of comparing their own.
Hating your city’s transportation system is a popular sport that has no winner. I don’t know if these people realize that all their TTC-bashing (and by extension, Giambrone-bashing) is cutting off their nose to spite their face.
If you end up with a mayor who suspends Transit City, that will be just great, won’t it? I hope these fools realize what they’re doing.
If Adam wants to stay on as chair, let him. He has a voracious appetite for knowledge and he has absorbed more information about transportation in the last 4 years than many of us could hope to in a lifetime. I agree with Miller, Adam should be trusted to see Transit City through.
Re: Raising the Allen
As is we need any more proof that this city is out to lunch. I say we investigate everyone involved in this idea and ensure that they are removed from the city payroll. That includes councillors. The fact that money was spent already is a crime.
Kevin, who exactly is complaining about the subway? The subway is just about the only good and reliable thing about the TTC, which becomes especially clear when it’s unavailable (e.g. that breached tunnel at St. Clair — the Star keeps running that picture of thousands of people waiting for shuttles at Yonge/Bloor).
Adam Giambrone’s tenure as chair can be characterized as long on dreams, short on execution. The TTC needs the latter, and Giambrone is the wrong guy to provide it. He should go, as should the rest of the commission board.
Somewhat telling that rounding up the days news results in 10 stories on Giambrone’s ‘affairs’ and 3 stories painting the TTC as a total disaster. And, yet, there’s that one, lone story that the TTC broke even for 2009! All these councillors and pundits calling for Giambrone to replaced, overhaul the management organization and all agree the TTC is nearing collapse. Sure it’s, got some problems, but it did balance its budget. Though, I suppose, no one will give the Chair any credit for that…
Kevin’s comment: “If Adam wants to stay on as chair, let him. He has a voracious appetite for knowledge and he has absorbed more information about transportation in the last 4 years than many of us could hope to in a lifetime.”
…
Leaving aside any obvious jokes about Councillor Giambrone’s “voracious appetite”, the issue isn’t how much someone knows but whether they are able to put it to good use. I might want to insist otherwise, but his record of actual accomplishment is quite thin. Of course the mayor is going to keep backing him — to do otherwise would confirm that his judgment about this individual has been wrong. There were problems at the TTC long before AG got there but the fact is that he has not exercised effective oversight. One can name any number of instances (the fiasco of St. Clair, the efforts to brush off passengers complaints about any number of things, the finger-pointing at management as soon as people start questioning his own role in the screw-ups). What angered me most is the story in the Star just before his mayoral launch in which he demonstrated his lack of understanding about the role of the TTC Chair. The likelihood is that he will stay on his Chair — but the fact that Moscoe and Miller are saying he’s done a good job is hardly a credible endorsement.
Giambrone knowledgeable on public transit? The fact that he seriously considered and even asked Gary Webster to look into high speed ferries for a cash strapped system or that he had never heard of shared track rail transit pours cold water on that belief.
I think St. Clair should be forbidden as a topic of conversation, unless some time is set aside to explain the anti-transit nuts that tried to oppose it in the first place, and somehow managed to have an injunction granted to temporarily halt it. Mentioning that it was behind schedule and over budget without mentioning the NIMBY ideologues that made it that way is conveniently deceptive.
And yes, Toronto has a quality subway system that will cost billions to extend, when that money can be used ten times over to improve surface transit via Transit City. If the TTC (or the City) ends up with leadership that will not see Transit City through, what actually *will* be done to improve transportation in Toronto?
So, Giambrone looks good as long as we’re not allowed to talk about the biggest TTC screwup in recent memory? All righty then.
The problems regarding the St. Clair project go WAYYY beyond what the “anti-transit nuts” (to use Kevin’s words) were or weren’t able to do. In any case, St. Clair wasn’t the only screw-up.
Kevin, you say you think “St. Clair should be forbidden as a topic of conversation”. My counterproposal would be that juvenile name-calling should be forbidden on this site.
Raising the Allen? Fail. Deck over it, as Eb Zeidler suggested, and create a huge swath of public space and a massive reduction in the noise propagated to the neighbourhood.
This is from the same braintrust that gave us the 14 lane Lakeshore idea I take it?
Re: Raising the Allen
Can’t they just build on top of the Allen? I’ve seen it done in some US cities where they just build on top of the sunken highway.
Give a TTC Worker a Valentine, by Michelle Langlois
http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/rabble-staff/2010/02/valentines-toronto-transit-workers
I have a confession to make this Valentine’s Day: I’m in like with Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) workers! I like them so much, I’ll be giving Valentines to as many as I can today, tomorrow, and Valentine’s Day. And so will over 70 other people.
TTC workers I have been in like with over the years include:
The many subway drivers who delighted in being our tour guides when trains were rerouted through the mysterious and unused Lower Bay Station in 2007…
The Thorncliffe Park bus driver I used to have a few years back, who would sing a goodbye song to the tune of “The Wheels on the Bus” in the morning when we reached the end of the line at Pape Station…
The College streetcar driver who went further than calling the stops, and gave us interesting and humourous information about the landmarks nearby…
The Dufferin subway station collector who believed me when I told him I forgot to take a transfer for my son on the connecting bus, and didn’t make us pay again…
The St. Clair West bus driver, and many others, who saw me running for the stop and slowed down to let me on the bus…
The Martin Grove bus driver who helped me find my way in an area of town with which I was completely unfamiliar at the time…
All the drivers who have chatted with my young son over the years…
And all the collectors who smile and tell me to have a nice day.
Over the last couple of weeks, it’s been terrible to see all the attacks from the public and media on Toronto’s transit workers. According to some reports, assaults on TTC operators have increased anywhere from twofold to tenfold during what can only be described as a vigilante “gotcha” campaign against TTC employees. Morale is low, and the workers are feeling besieged as a result.
That’s no way for anyone to spend their working life.
If you’re in Toronto, why not join me in showing your appreciation for TTC workers? Give a TTC employee a Valentine.
To be fair the TTC and it’s commission, remember that there is no operating budget from either senior level of government and getting capital money is like prying teeth from an enraged, hungry bear. That the massive investment in Transit City happened at all is a miracle, IMHO.
However, full disclosure: I live in Victoria, BC.