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Everyone who relies on the Toronto Transit Commission to get to work or school knows “TTC” really stands for “Take The Car.” But given the horrendous traffic drivers must deal with, that’s not a great option either. An Ipsos poll for the Toronto Region Board of Trade finds 86 per cent of respondents agree either strongly (45 per cent) or somewhat (41 per cent) that “there is a traffic and congestion crisis in the GTA (Greater Toronto Area).” Similarly, 85 per cent agree that “traffic and congestion have a negative impact on the economy in the GTA.”
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Traffic seems to be getting worse: 42 per cent of those who commute at least 10 minutes to work or school say their commute takes longer than it did a year ago versus only 12 per cent who say it takes less time, with the balance saying it takes about the same. Because of road and traffic congestion in the GTA, 42 per cent of residents say they have avoided going shopping, while 38 per cent have avoided going to a restaurant.
The economic impacts go beyond that, however. Traffic is also keeping people out of offices and reducing their productivity. Sixty-two per cent of poll respondents say it makes them reluctant to travel to work, while 59 per cent say they are less productive at work because of the time lost commuting due to traffic. Traffic is increasing office absenteeism and discouraging workforce participation, the Toronto Region Board of Trade noted.
In one of his essays, Milton Friedman made an interesting observation about transportation. The private automobile industry is able to produce all the automobiles people want to drive and the private aircraft industry is able to produce all the airplanes that commercial airlines want to buy, but there are serious problems with highway congestion and bottlenecks in airports. Why? The government is unable to build a highway system on par with private industry’s ability to build cars, and government-controlled airports are run worse than private aircraft manufacturers. Hence the title of Friedman’s essay: “Why Government is the Problem.” (True, Friedman was writing in 1993, before Boeing began to run into quality problems — or itself became so dependent on the U.S. government.)
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The TTC, the transit commission that has everyone wanting to take the car, is also government-owned and -controlled. One of its signature traits is system delays. Repairs, people on the tracks, security incidents and so on cause many of the delays. No doubt they could be prevented by better management, but they are at least explicable. Other delays are not.
Several weeks ago I endured a lengthy delay at the King Station in downtown Toronto because the subway operator felt the platform was too crowded and so refused to move the train. At first, the platform was not much more crowded than usual, but with the train refusing to move it naturally become extremely crowded — in self-fulfillment of the operator’s rationale for the delay. By the time the train finally did move out of King Station and reached Queen Station — surprise! — the platform at Queen was inordinately crowded because of the extended delay at King. The subway operator therefore refused to budge out of Queen Station, imposing another lengthy delay. And so on.
Another reason people would rather take the car is lack of safety on the TTC, particularly given Toronto’s problems with crime, drugs and homelessness. Violent attacks on the TTC reached a crisis point in late 2022 and early 2023, leading the City of Toronto, TTC and Toronto Police to publish data on violence in the TTC.
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To the TTC’s credit, in the past year and a half it has launched several safety initiatives and the data do show the rate of violent offences has trended downward since January 2023. Yet even as the rate (per million boardings) of violent offences declines, it’s not clear violence is falling in absolute terms. In the second quarter of 2024, “only” 495 major crimes on the TTC were reported to Toronto Police. That’s down year-over-year, but it was the third consecutive quarter in which the violent crime count increased.
Take the car, then, or take the TTC? For Torontonians who need to get around the city, government has seen to it that neither is a great option.
Financial Post
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