Graffiti 2009-10

AHRON SEMAN

I guess I’m a TTCer. Don’t blame me; I wouldn’t take it if I didn’t absolutely have to – there are just no other options. It’s not completely horrendous; it eventually gets you where you’re going (most of the time). It’s just that sometimes it seems as though the TTC isn`t aware they are a public service, and act as some sort of corrupt institution that can be run without rules, regulations or standards.

I’ve been wronged by the TTC just as much as the next guy, probably more, and I just take it in stride. Within the last couple months the TTC has destroyed my perfect on-time record and shortchanged me upwards of $170! It’s just a mediocre public service, I remind myself. I was able to maintain this principle until they confirmed that come January, they would raise the price for this miserable service to a laughably high level from an already ridiculous amount!

Where is all of our money going anyway? It certainly doesn’t seem as if the TTC is using it to make any improvements. One recent waste of our money was the St. Clair Streetcar project: dedicated lanes for streetcars to make service faster. Several years behind schedule, it’s almost finished. Most of the track is open now, and it somehow takes me longer to get to school! Thanks a lot. Any chance the TTC can serve my soon-to-come early sign-ins?

As far as I’m concerned there are two ways to run an organization like the TTC. Either as a cheap, poor-quality service where patrons are mistreated, schedules aren’t met and facilities are filthy, but fares remain cheap. Or, it could be run as an expensive, quality service where customers are treated as deserved, service is timely and facilities are adequately hygienic, but customers pay the price. I’m okay with either of these scenarios; but the TTC offers neither. They offer a combination of the two.

The TTC offers us loyal patrons a dismal service at a high (and constantly rising) price. No normal business could sustain this. Of course, customers would not remain loyal to businesses that mistreat them amd rip them off all at once. So why do commuters remain loyal to the TTC? It’s because they have a monopoly. The controlling influence in a monopoly can do great things for a business. Personally, I admire a business that can appropriately take advantage of a monopoly, but there’s a difference between a business and the TTC. The TTC is a public service and a business is a profit-motivated enterprise. The monopoly the TTC has is one given to them by Torontonians, and so Torontonians should be benefiting from it as opposed to suffering. The TTC, however, doesn’t hesitate when inflicting mass pain and suffering on us with their monopoly.

As one of our public services here in Toronto, the TTC owes it to us to stop taking unfair advantage of its monopoly and must do one of two things. Either choose to become cheap and remain inferior – or start providing quality service and remain priced for royalty. We as students, the most powerful group of customers of the TTC, must respectfully remind them of their duties and the standards they must uphold. Until such a time that the TTC chooses to stop bullying their loyal clients, they will remain an organization of bullies. Some say it’s not a good idea to run from bullies; well, at least it’s faster than taking the TTC.