"The Better Way"......better than what, exactly?

It is always something with the TTC, Isn’t it? If you’re not the meat in a smelly stranger sandwich then you’re suffocating in the stale, re-cycled air, perfumed by a cocktail of nauseating scents, which often include: street meat, B.O, alcohol, cheap cologne and farts.

Or, maybe you are standing in a long, disorganized, free-for-all of a line, shouting obscenities in your head at those complete dicks who decide that the space you have generously left front of you as thoroughfare for other TTC patrons, is actually just a place for them to stand (“I am so happy you are finally here! I have been saving this spot for you all morning!”).

And what about the obliviously inconsiderate slow-walkers? Those who amble along aimlessly, clearly in the midst of whatever retarded daydream their dull, unimaginative mind can muster, paying no mind to whom they bump into or where they stumble. With an empty head, save for the buzzing flies in the place of a human brain, they saunter casually onto the train and then just STOP at the entrance; effectively blocking the doorway for the 50 people queued up behind them.

Everyone seems to have their own gripe with the TTC, whether it’s the mouth- breathing mob of drooling malcontents who try to push their way into the train before anyone can exit, or the bus you take to work every morning that seems to show up whenever the hell it feels like it. The list of grievances I, and like-minded sane people, have about the TTC is long enough to be written on a scroll.

So, let’s get off the topic of the barbarously uncouth TTC customers for a moment and try to crack down on the soulnessness of TTC operations as a whole.

First you have the TTC employees: they hate you.

No matter how polite you are, how courteous, how much you smile during your interaction with them, they hate you and are just biding their time until the next chance they get to shut a train door in your face, or speed away in their bus (ignoring you running desperately behind them), or to just sneer and grunt at you when you ask for change.

I once attempted to buy a metro pass at Ossington station and was met with the reply of , “no.”

Not, “ no, sorry, we are sold out,” or, “ we don’t have any, but they may have some left at Younge.” Just, “no.” Care to elaborate?

Be honest, have you ever clutched a steaming cup of hot coffee in your hands and tried to determine if the benefits outweigh the consequences of hurling it directly into the smug and disgruntled face of a TTC operator? I think about this almost every morning.

It seems that the only thing stinky-er and more incompetent than a TTC employee is the service itself. At the end of most commute filled days, I find myself full of gripes and questions for the TTC. Questions such as:

• Do you use the token machines as piggy banks that you crack open once you feel they have stolen enough change? Seriously, you owe me about $20.
• Why can’t you figure out how to get the trains to work properly during a heavy snowfall? Hasn’t there been a heavy snowfall at least once every winter since you have existed?
• During rush hour, why does the westbound train on the Bloor-line show up every 2 minutes for the approximate 4 people waiting for it? While the other 75 of us trying to go eastbound have to push ourselves into the clown car that comes every 7 minutes? I think its cause your all sadists.

It’s enough to make you set fire to your metro pass, isn’t it?

So what’s your gripe? The TTC actually has a section of their website devoted to comments, suggestions and complaints:

http://www3.ttc.ca/Contact_Us/Complaints_Compliments_Suggestions/Suggestions_complaint.jsp

(Get this, they also have a section for compliments ! HA!)

Write them and tell them how much you hate them. I’m planning to. You can even do it anonymously if you are afraid there will be some sort of repercussions (I don’t for a second believe they are competent or organized enough for that.)