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Friday, November 14, 2014

Safety breach on the TTC: Subway power rail went live before evacuation was complete

5 comments:

Valentino Assenza said...

IDIOTS!!

The TTC has been doing a "better" job when it comes to customer service, however, when it comes to safety, there needs to be way more due dilligence, with the screening process when it comes to hiring employees,training, and coaching.

I have written not one but two complaint letters due to negligent driving on the part of bus drivers while I was on the vehicles. Between exceeding speed limits, to hard stops, to not even asking if one of their passengers is okay when they fall over, or smack their arm off of a pole, the comfort, safety, and welfare of the average customer is not taken into account.

It's great that they have bus drivers that like to use their microphone to tell jokes (actually sometimes it's just plain annoying their jokes, would have been gonged on the gong show within seconds), but if they are hopping a curb, running a red light, or nearly side swiping a vehicle while doing it something needs to be done.

This article could have been a much more tragic account. I don't want anyone to get hurt, I don't want anyone to get fired, but yo TTC, take your heads out of your ass. Your industry is PUBLIC TRANSIT, so start ackowledging the public already.

Squiggles said...

@Valentino

I had a similar experience with a bus driver in my community (not TTC). I actually called in and talked to a customer service representative. The driver was always early (until she was 10 mins early), did the hard stops, overshot stops by 10' (at least) because she wasn't paying attention to the fact that there *might* be a passenger, etc.

10 days later? A different driver on that route. The thing is: it is harder to ignore the person on the phone than to misfile a piece of paper, delete an email, etc.

As for this story: I hope heads rolled. I am sorry that someone might have lost their job. But that is a far sight better than someone losing their life.

Valentino Assenza said...

@Squiggles

You must have won the telephone lottery then, because when I have tried to call, they simply give me "Yes, I understand your frustration, but you must formally file a complaint online."

Let me just say I am always polite to TTC staff. Without fail, it's basically a reflex now, that I say "thank you" when they let me off at a stop. I have even gotten drivers backs when people give them attitude over paying a fare.

But negligence is negligence, it's cool that people have the ingenuity to get themselves a job with the TTC, and collect their $25.00 an hour, but they have to realize there is way more to their job than that.

Good on you for the successful phone call.

Have a good weekend! Peace!

Squiggles said...

Ditto with regards to staff. I always wish everyone a good day/evening/weekend (I don't thank them for stopping however. It is their job).

As regards to my phone call, I think it was because it wasn't TTC that is why it worked. I focused mainly on the safety issue as well. I figure, if anything, not being sued would garner more success than ignoring the situation.

Have a wonderful weekend. And good luck! Keep trying, talk to management, if need be, try contacting Andy Byford and even your Councillor.

Anonymous said...

Power is off at Museum because of a jumper at St. George (i.e. suicide attempt). They (aka ttc response people) probably needed to move the train that smacked the guy off said guy, and the only way to do that is to restore power momentarily.

Somebody forgot to do something to prevent the power from going on at Museum, or can't isolate that section from St. George. They are in the middle of trying to save somebody from under a train, while another group is walking passengers 20 feet to a platform, no where near the third rail. Mistakes happen, especially in emergencies. Nobody got hurt at Museum. Those people walking beside the track had as much chance of getting electrocuted at you do standing on the platform. Just don't ever touch any of the rails.

This, on the other hand, is quite scary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wo5a95To1wk That is a supervisor walking at track level to get a lost article. He stumbles, and falls with his head about 1 ft from the power rail, with it on, with the rest of his body grounded on the running rails. The people at Museum were in no danger at any time, including the employee standing between the rails.