City councillor wants Toronto to follow New York's lead on transit safety

Article content

City Councillor Brad Bradford would like to see Toronto take a cue from New York City when it comes to improving transit safety.

“I was talking to someone who was down there about a month ago and they were riding the transit and they said, ‘Every station and every train, you’re seeing Special Constables,’ and I think we need to get closer to that,” Bradford said. “Right now it’s exceptional that you see them (here).”

This after Bradford added his comments to a post on X about someone’s recent terrible experience on the TTC, which was texted to a friend and shared by Montrealer @Anthony_Koch on Thursday morning.

“Today on the subway a crackhead smashed his head off the window and is banging the walls loudly,” begins the text. “It scared baby, the baby starts to cry. The homeless man yells at the baby ‘shut the f–k up,’ points at it. Then looks up and says, ‘You’re all f—ing dead. Such a nice place to live and work. Now the small infant is screaming loudly. And homeless man is screaming loudly. The mother is stunned. The are no police or security in sight!!!”

“This is why so many people don’t feel safe taking the TTC,” Bradford posted on his X account, @BradMBradford, including @Anthony_Koch’s friend’s text.

“We need to invest in more security on transit – not just ‘information agents’ who do nothing for fare evasion or safety.”

TTC spokesman Stuart Green said he couldn’t “comment on the incident as the original post had no information anyone could use to verify its veracity.”

“With respect to safety in general, the safety of customers and employees is paramount to all we do,” Green said. “Over the past five years, the TTC has invested tens of millions of new dollars directed at boosting the presence of staff, upgrading safety systems like intercoms and cameras, hiring more special constables and entering partnerships with crisis intervention specialists.”

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

Try refreshing your browser, or
tap here to see other videos from our team.

Play Video

Bradford told the Toronto Sun on Friday that he hears from constituents every day who “don’t feel safe riding the TTC when there’s violent outbursts, when there’s needles sticking out of the seats, or there is a lot of anti-social behaviour that has become commonplace there.”

“So we should have more Special Constables,” he said.

Said Green: “Incident rates have been trending down in the past three years, and customers report feeling safer on the TTC in recent surveys. Still, we don’t take that for granted, and we continue to review and enhance safety measures to ensure everyone is safe while riding or working on our system.”

Bradford didn’t have an exact number in mind in terms of hiring Special Constables, but he thinks they should be a heavy presence like they are in New York City.

He pointed out that one of the first things Mayor Olivia Chow did after she was elected was hire 200 transit information agents.

“I think those resources would have been much better directed into resources or staff that are going to keep our customers safe and make sure that we’re closing the loop on the $130 million that we lost in fare invasion last year,” Bradford said.