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LRT Safety

To the posting above, Knack said the $20 million would have been the cost to allow youth 18 and under to use transit for free but no member of council put forward that motion.

Why can't media get facts right.
 
^^^^

gunter is taking on an apples and oranges discussion...

yes, safety is an issue but it's an issue irrespective of whether fares are charged or not.

children under 12 are already able to ride transit by paying a fare or being in possession of a youth ticket.

does gunter somehow think that transit safety is less of an issue if fares are charged vs fares not being charged???
 
Man, I subjected myself to that op-ed and it just reminds me of how much I don't like the guy.

"Bravo to Sun reader Nelson Cabral for spotting a problem almost no one at City Hall has clued into."

No, Lorne. Council is pretty well aware of the safety issues on the LRT. They're not sure what to do about it mind, but it's a known problem.

"Still, “progressive” councillors are recommending the city turn its trains and buses into rolling shopping centres for child predators."

Pretty disingenuous. I'm not even saying that the safety issues don't exist but I'm not exactly sure what kids are supposed to do when their parents can't drive them and they legally / physically can't drive themselves. If we're just removing costs, aren't they already riding anyway then?

Kids could bike in protected lanes so cars can't hit them. That would be the safest option for the children and it gets them off his lawn. Childrens safety is very important to the columnist, so naturally Mr. Gunter would have absolutely no problem with the city building and maintaining them...right?

"local elections in Portland, Ore., a U.S. city our planners very much take their cues from. There, local leaders have been so respectful of street people that whole swaths of downtown have become no-go zones"

...C'mon. You and I both know what you're doing bringing up Portland. I'll grab some marshmallows to take with me to the states because the city burned to the ground right?

Seriously, the safety issues can be fixed, and yeah, its not great right now. But that shouldn't preclude anyone from trying to improve the system itself because half the issue is that ridership is low.
 
I am often quite negative about Edmonton Transit's service, but I do think the additional peace officers have helped a lot, particularly in the LRT stations.

I do think the problems were allowed to get out of hand, they were slow to react and the huge reduction of regular users during COVID created a vacuum for problematic people to jump in. However, things are getting better now.

Part of the problem is it takes time for perceptions to change. A few weeks ago I was talking about transit with a several people and they were telling me how terrible it was. Interestingly, none (except me) were using it at that time. I think they just came to that conclusion from what they had seen or read in the news. I did tell them, hey its really not that bad.
 
^Agreed. I've taken the LRT a few times in the last year and it feels better than it sounded on the news. That said, the station entrances (Bay, Central, Churchill) were all the bigger part of the issue, with folks sleeping, passed out, doing drugs and congregating on the stairs down.
 

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