[caption id="attachment_7569" align="alignnone" width="497"]
It took this quartet of transit personnel to stop one fare evader, who's around the corner.[/caption]
Yesterday morning I watched the well-oiled, and financed, TransLink machine stop fare evasion in it's tracks. It took one bus driver, two transit supervisors, two transit security guards, and over one hour, but they stopped one half-drunk First Nations guy from getting on a bus for free so he could get home before he passed out. It was awesome, let me tell you.
Dave isn't really a bad guy. Some would say he has a mischievous sense of humour, and it's fair to say he has poor impulse control. There's a reason his nickname is Dave "Warrant." Monday morning, when I saw that skinny, obviously half-in-the-bag, aboriginal guy making his wobbly way up Broadway towards the McDonald's, I said to myself: "Here comes trouble."
I was having breakfast. Florida Pete was sitting beside me, talking away, as I worked on my Remembrance Day post. Dave might have been working on a beer, cleverly disguised in a take-away, paper coffee cup, or it may have been coffee, or Listerine or rubbing alcohol. It was hard to say. He walked up to the open doors of the Number Nine transit bus and tried to board.
To be sure Dave was tipsy, and certainly had no money for the fare. For whatever reason, the driver wasn't letting Dave on the bus. Dave tried several approaches but they were all rebuffed.
I wanted to finish my post, but the unfolding street drama distracted me -- I could see what was coming next: Dave wouldn't get mad but he would try to get even. He was only out of sight for a moment, then he came into the McDonald's to confer with Pete and myself.
Dave declared the bus driver wasn't going anywhere. Pete and I followed his gaze; he'd pulled one of the bus trolley poles off the overhead wire. "He going to have to come out," Dave declared, expectantly. If the driver came out to reattach the pole to the wire I think Dave was planning to jump on the bus and try to get away with sitting in the back. But the driver didn't have to come out.
He waited for a two-person TransLink Road Services crew, both wearing "Transit Supervisor" jackets, then he came out of the bus. Dave went outside where he and one of the crew had a frank discussion, perhaps about etiquette. After the bus was back on it's way, the Road Services crew stayed -- waiting patiently, along with Dave. Someone, at some point, had called transit security.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Dave and Pete and the Road Crew amused themselves. I worked on my post and lost track of the situation. but at one point I looked up, and two transit security guards were there. At first I thought they were transit police, but they weren't wearing guns. One of them was writing out what looked like a ticket, which is pretty much what the transit security guards do. Nothing else notable happened. Dave didn't cause a scene. He'd earlier confided that he was drop-dead tired, and just wanted to get home.
So I watched TransLink stop an inebriated fare evader (there never was any chance of Dave paying), at a fairly substantial cost. I should emphasize that Dave would have presented as somewhat drunk when the bus driver barred him from getting on the bus, but Dave wasn't being lippy, loud, or abusive. He was friendly. Come New Year's Eve the transit system will happily give free rides to thousands of rude, abusive, loud, and very drunk revelers. But Monday wasn't New Year's Eve.
If transit security did write Dave a ticket they wasted a slip of paper. I don't suppose they gave him a ride home, so maybe he repeated the entire process 10 blocks further east on Broadway. I also don't know where the blue-jacketed Genesis security company guy was. The one paid for by the South Granville Business Improvement Association (SGBIA), to patrol the area and look for "street disorder." He's been in the McDonald's this morning at least three times already, but nowhere to be seen yesterday. Oh, that's right. Yesterday was a legal holiday, and he would've had to be paid more by the SGBIA. And they obviously didn't want to waste the money.
[caption id="attachment_7572" align="alignnone" width="497"]
A mobility scooter user's un-used two-year-old book of bus tickets.[/caption]
When I mentioned yesterday's event to a McDonald's regular who gets around in a mobility scooter, they told me they didn't take the bus very often and had yet to pay the fare when they did. They mentioned two other people -- one using a scooter, and another in a motorized wheelchair -- who don't pay either. They all just scoot by the drivers. The person I spoke to had thought they were exempt from paying the bus fare, until one day a driver did ask for a ticket.
They handed the driver their whole booklet of tickets, because they needed help tearing the ticket out. The got the booklet back, and it wasn't until they were back home that they saw the driver had detached a ticket but tucked it neatly back into the booklet. They explained they do pay for the HandyDART accessible transit service provided by TransLink. Click the images to enlarge them.
It took this quartet of transit personnel to stop one fare evader, who's around the corner.[/caption]Yesterday morning I watched the well-oiled, and financed, TransLink machine stop fare evasion in it's tracks. It took one bus driver, two transit supervisors, two transit security guards, and over one hour, but they stopped one half-drunk First Nations guy from getting on a bus for free so he could get home before he passed out. It was awesome, let me tell you.
Dave isn't really a bad guy. Some would say he has a mischievous sense of humour, and it's fair to say he has poor impulse control. There's a reason his nickname is Dave "Warrant." Monday morning, when I saw that skinny, obviously half-in-the-bag, aboriginal guy making his wobbly way up Broadway towards the McDonald's, I said to myself: "Here comes trouble."
Dave's reputation for trouble precedes him
I was having breakfast. Florida Pete was sitting beside me, talking away, as I worked on my Remembrance Day post. Dave might have been working on a beer, cleverly disguised in a take-away, paper coffee cup, or it may have been coffee, or Listerine or rubbing alcohol. It was hard to say. He walked up to the open doors of the Number Nine transit bus and tried to board.
To be sure Dave was tipsy, and certainly had no money for the fare. For whatever reason, the driver wasn't letting Dave on the bus. Dave tried several approaches but they were all rebuffed.
I wanted to finish my post, but the unfolding street drama distracted me -- I could see what was coming next: Dave wouldn't get mad but he would try to get even. He was only out of sight for a moment, then he came into the McDonald's to confer with Pete and myself.
Dave declared the bus driver wasn't going anywhere. Pete and I followed his gaze; he'd pulled one of the bus trolley poles off the overhead wire. "He going to have to come out," Dave declared, expectantly. If the driver came out to reattach the pole to the wire I think Dave was planning to jump on the bus and try to get away with sitting in the back. But the driver didn't have to come out.
He waited for a two-person TransLink Road Services crew, both wearing "Transit Supervisor" jackets, then he came out of the bus. Dave went outside where he and one of the crew had a frank discussion, perhaps about etiquette. After the bus was back on it's way, the Road Services crew stayed -- waiting patiently, along with Dave. Someone, at some point, had called transit security.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Dave and Pete and the Road Crew amused themselves. I worked on my post and lost track of the situation. but at one point I looked up, and two transit security guards were there. At first I thought they were transit police, but they weren't wearing guns. One of them was writing out what looked like a ticket, which is pretty much what the transit security guards do. Nothing else notable happened. Dave didn't cause a scene. He'd earlier confided that he was drop-dead tired, and just wanted to get home.
So I watched TransLink stop an inebriated fare evader (there never was any chance of Dave paying), at a fairly substantial cost. I should emphasize that Dave would have presented as somewhat drunk when the bus driver barred him from getting on the bus, but Dave wasn't being lippy, loud, or abusive. He was friendly. Come New Year's Eve the transit system will happily give free rides to thousands of rude, abusive, loud, and very drunk revelers. But Monday wasn't New Year's Eve.
If transit security did write Dave a ticket they wasted a slip of paper. I don't suppose they gave him a ride home, so maybe he repeated the entire process 10 blocks further east on Broadway. I also don't know where the blue-jacketed Genesis security company guy was. The one paid for by the South Granville Business Improvement Association (SGBIA), to patrol the area and look for "street disorder." He's been in the McDonald's this morning at least three times already, but nowhere to be seen yesterday. Oh, that's right. Yesterday was a legal holiday, and he would've had to be paid more by the SGBIA. And they obviously didn't want to waste the money.
People pay but people in scooters and wheelchairs don't, right?
[caption id="attachment_7572" align="alignnone" width="497"]
A mobility scooter user's un-used two-year-old book of bus tickets.[/caption]When I mentioned yesterday's event to a McDonald's regular who gets around in a mobility scooter, they told me they didn't take the bus very often and had yet to pay the fare when they did. They mentioned two other people -- one using a scooter, and another in a motorized wheelchair -- who don't pay either. They all just scoot by the drivers. The person I spoke to had thought they were exempt from paying the bus fare, until one day a driver did ask for a ticket.
They handed the driver their whole booklet of tickets, because they needed help tearing the ticket out. The got the booklet back, and it wasn't until they were back home that they saw the driver had detached a ticket but tucked it neatly back into the booklet. They explained they do pay for the HandyDART accessible transit service provided by TransLink. Click the images to enlarge them.
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Toooo Funny!
Karen