Carbon Tax and Service Improvements

I glimpsed a headline today about a Carbon Tax in the wings the help curb emissions. Much like
the cigarette tax curbed smoking. Let's hope the government uses the money from the proposed tax wisely and improves service for public transit. The way to get people riding the buses and trains is to improve service. The strange thing is that transit does not know what do do with the money. Here are a few tips:

1) Make TTC and Go Transit stations wheelchair accessible. I still find it ironic that Appleby Station, a relatively new station does not have elevators. I also find it hard to believe that the Yonge and Bloor subway station which is a link between the two subway lines has no elevator for the bloor line access and only one elevator to get to street level. Someone with a stroller or a wheelchair have no way to the surface if the one elevator is broken like it was today.

2) New switches. It is also odd that the main reason for Go Transit delays is switch problems yet when money comes in to help transit, the first thought isn't let's repair them. Its let's see how we can use it to open more lines and make money that way. If switches worked more regularly you would get less delays and more of us would take the existing trains.

A funny thing happened the other day that shows how much they are listening. I was at union for the first working day of the month. One of the TTC managers was looking at the line and trying to figure out why there were some many people in line and nobody using the machines. I proceeded to tell him that the MetroPass machines do not get filled until 9:00am after the morning rush. Also two of the token machines were broken. He was shocked and said we should do something about that. Its funny because for the past 6 months I have been sending in feedback to ttc. I sent on something to Metrolynk and even posted it here on my blog that I know is read by TTC and Go Transit staff as they have commented on it.

I look forward to seeing if this new Carbon Tax will be use properly or if its just another way for the government to get money and look like they are doing things for the environment.