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Six years ago, a “TTC Customer Service Advisory Panel” issued a series of recommendations that made my head ache: it proposed an “audit” of the TTC’s “brand;” it fretted there were “few healthy food options within subway stations;” no word of a lie, it suggested slowing down surface vehicle routes to save people the indignity of running for a bus and missing it.

It was well-intentioned lunacy. If you’re on your third short-turning streetcar of the day, a rude driver might make you angrier — but regardless, your customer service score will be zero. In transit, “customer service” is little more than getting people where they need to be on time.

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Under CEO Andy Byford, who recently marked five years on the job, some of Toronto’s major transit irritants about riding have diminished. “We have dramatically reduced the number of short-turns, long the source of complaint in this city,” Byford told a lunch audience at the Board of Trade on Tuesday. There are fewer and shorter subway delays, he said; stations are cleaner and safer; the shiny new air-conditioned streetcars are much nicer to ride; as Presto catches on, the dystopian insanity of waiting in line to exchange cash for tokens will disappear.