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Monday, April 2, 2018

Only takes a day like today to see how many passengers work for banks and government (and something something reduced GO fares)

Parking at Oshawa was like it was in the good ol' days (before the 2010-12 housing boom in north Oshawa to Bowmanville).

I hope y'all had a nice Easter weekend. I went for my first 20+ km bike ride of 2018. I rode up to Hampton and back down for a total of 23 km. It was brisk to say the least, but it felt good to be back in the saddle, fully healed from all of my injuries over the past 3.5 years. It's nice to have all the power and flexibility back in both knees. It makes pedaling in the wind easier, that's for sure.

I'm interested in hearing thoughts about the Ontario budget for fiscal year 2018-19. The Ontario Liberals are promising to slash GO Transit fares to $3 for all journeys within Toronto, as well as for short trips anywhere on the network, while opening the door to uploading the city’s subway system.

Here's more on this promise on the Globe and Mail website.

Those of us in the 905, well, not much in that budget for us, was there? If anything, our fares will rise significantly to subsidize those in Toronto.

SURE WISH WE HAD A GODDAMN SUBWAY FROM OSHAWA TO TORONTO.

(breathes heavily)

10 comments:

G said...

Nice ride, CJ!

I did see the budget proposal and had the same thought as you. People within Toronto already have a cheap way of getting around: the TTC! Meanwhile you and I are paying $20/day to get downtown and the fare just keeps going up year after year. Worse yet, the feds eliminated the public transit tax credit so it's almost untenable to keep taking the train instead of driving to work every day. If my spouse also worked downtown it wouldn't even be close.

Skin Man said...

Glad to hear about the knees!

Yeah - that was the biggest, buy your vote budget, ever. : - (

Bicky said...

Parking was a breeze this morning. Loved it!

And that budget did NOTHING to Wynne me over to vote for the FIBerals. Not a damn thing! Not looking forward to my GO fares going up to subsidize the TO peeps who already have the TTC.

Karen said...

I know it flips your narrative a bit, but banks and federal government offices were open today. Municipal, some provincial and associated areas were closed. Today want a federal holiday. If you want to check traffic on that, watch on November 11

CJ Smith said...

Interesting, some friends who GO who work in banks had today off. No fair!

deepfish said...

Twenty years ago, almost, I came to Toronto from Seoul. Seoul metropolitan area is about the same size as the GTA, with analogous west-east alignment. The day I left Seoul I used a type of Presto-pass (then - 20 years ago - considered established tech) to ride a small commuter bus from the equivalent of Ajax to the equivalent of southern Scarborough. From there I caught a subway, made one transfer, and was at the airport (located analogous to Western Mississauga). All of this took me a bit over an hour.

I couldn't find a map from the era, but here's a present day link: https://goo.gl/images/RPzWk3

When I was there, the network of subways was about half the size. Get that - they have doubled capacity in 20 years.

We're still fighting over a useless 1 stop Scarberia line.

Plus, the equivalent of GO Trains are fully integrated into the subway system. You can go from the downtown train station in Seoul by commuter rail to practically anywhere in teh country (analogous to southern Ontario).

They had about 95 PRIVATE bus lines, competing for bus routes... on any one bus line there would be 4-5 different companies competing. If you missed the Blue Number 5 Bus, a Green or an Orange would be by in 5 minutes.

You'd pay single fare of about a buck for a greyhound style bus, 50 cents for bare metal city style bus, and 25 cents or so for a local neighbourhood combi bus.

When I arrived in Toronto I had to pay top dollar for a cab to downtown. In Seoul, the trip had cost me a little over a buck. 30 times as much here.
The very next day, a friend actually asked me how it felt to "be back in a city with a developed transit system"
Gales of laughter.


Unknown said...

I work at a Bank.
We only get Good Friday off. Just like everyone.
We don’t get Easter Monday off.
The only additional day in a calendar year we get off is Remembrance Day.

Anonymous said...

I agree. It’s mainly government workers where you notice the ridership and parking difference.
It’s nice when the teachers & students are off school and aren’t commandeering the train/‘s thriughtout the summer too.

Anonymous said...

Just another of Kathleen's attempts to "buy" votes! With her new proposal everyone up to Ajax (I think) gets that $3 fare and those of us that live further don't get that same benefit. If it's a true transit benefit it should be for everyone.

Ed said...

Wynne cares about Toronto voters and nobody else. This is the most cynical vote buying scheme that I've noticed in a long time and Liberals are famous for crap like this.

She is using the fare decrease to divide up the 905 and 416 because as usual, the 905ers and beyond are not worthy of any consideration. Only 416 is important.

Why do people vote for reckless spenders like Wynne?