Their numbers were similar to last week’s transit workers union town hall designed to foster better relations between frontline TTC workers and riders, but Sunday’s crowd of about 200 transit riders at a Scarborough high school was more vocal and more confrontational.

Although there were some questions about how the transit system works — or doesn’t work — riders were focused this week on the behaviour of transit workers rather than individual bus routes or personal issues with the TTC.

Those who attended the second in the series of union-organized meetings at Stephen Leacock Collegiate Institute wanted to know why some drivers and collectors behave rudely, take breaks while passengers sit on the bus, apply some of the rules inconsistently and why the system is so dirty.

Several objected loudly to the format of the meeting.

“Throughout this meeting your answers have been taking over our questions,” said Ryan Endoh, who came with a prepared statement complaining about the “profane language” and “gross indifference” he had experienced on the system.

Questions and comments from the audience were confined to a minute, while panelists and TTC union head Bob Kinnear were taking four minutes to respond, he said.

Endoh told the auditorium about being verbally assaulted by a transit worker when he tried once to explain that he didn’t have his student pass because he had been ill and taken to the hospital.

For the second week, the panel of TTC drivers on the stage, were quick to apologize for the rude behaviour of some of their co-workers.

Nine out of 10 times when a passenger pleasantly explains they haven’t got the correct fare, driver Laverne Snagg said she lets the person on without argument.

She encouraged riders to note the bus number, the route and time and complain to the TTC when they encounter similar situations.

“We are reprimanded. It is normally addressed,” she said.

“Are drivers allowed extended breaks when there are people on board?” said Venesse Lewis, who compared rider frustration in such incidents to the bus arriving 20 minutes late.

She too was frustrated by the format of the two-hour meeting in which only people whose names were drawn from a box by the meeting moderator were allowed to speak.

“I wish more people were able to say things,” said Lewis.

York University graduate student Leia Toledo wanted to know if drivers have access to anger management.

They do but everybody has bad days, she was told.

After the meeting, Toledo said the exercise was valuable but riders have to demand a follow-up meeting with a report on what’s changed on the TTC.

Last week a TTC driver was charged following a dispute with a passenger over an allegedly unpaid fare.

While several speakers thanked the union for the opportunity to gather, one woman complained that it should have been organized by TTC management.

She drew applause for calling for the firing of TTC chair Adam Giambrone, who was sitting nearby.

Although he maintained a cordial approach to riders in the room, union president Bob Kinnear used the meeting to take some shots at TTC management, saying that an automated signalling system on the subway is responsible for large overtime bills.

A recent proposal to install platform edge doors that would prevent people from jumping or falling on the tracks is more about justifying the signal system, said Kinnear.

“Overtime rates have gone through the roof because trains are late. Operators are forced to go beyond their schedules every day,” he said, noting when that happens the worker gets double time.

“Maybe next time we’ll have to negotiate triple time,” he said.

TTC chief general manager Gary Webster, who was in the audience, later denied that the signalling system called speed control was responsible for climbing overtime.

“(Speed control) has been in operation on the Sheppard line. It’s not working properly. We have not put it in place on the other two lines. There’s no question we’ve struggled with the reliability of speed control and we’re not going to work it until we can get it to run properly,” said Webster.

But that has no bearing on the new automatic train control signalling system being installed on the Yonge line in the next four or five years, he said.

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In the morning rush hour, the Yonge subway is at capacity, said Webster. “Automatic train control will deal with that,” and new subway trains coming later this year will also help.

Speed control, which cost about $15 million, was introduced on Sheppard in the last two years. Automatic train control is a $300 million system.

One rider complained about a driver’s failure to take a valid transfer when it was proffered.

“I don’t touch the transfers either,” said Jeff Gill, a driver on the union panel. “You see people coming up the steps with the transfer in their mouth. I don’t want that in my hand. There are too many communicable diseases.”

Some complained that not all drivers and collectors required seniors and students to show their passes.

“There are major inconsistencies out there with the enforcement of fares because it’s a judgement call (by individual transit workers),” said Kinnear.

When one rider complained that TTC patrons have to pay to park at stations, while GO passengers park for free, Kinnear suggested that the parking fees introduced last year are an attempt to penalize commuters from the 905 communities around Toronto.

“There needs to be a recognition that people are utilizing our service — the cost is absorbed solely by Torontonians,” he said.

A third town hall takes place May 2 at Ryerson University. Details and an opportunity to comment are available on the union’s website, wemovetoronto.ca.

Meantime, the TTC’s external panel of customer service experts is also hosting a series of meet-and-greet sessions in the subway system starting later this months in advance of the recommendations it will be delivering to improve customer satisfaction.

The outreach efforts by the union and the commission follow a rash of bad publicity on the system that started with the announcement of a fare hike late last year. That was followed by token hoarding and shortages and then widespread images of a sleeping subway collector and video of a driver taking an unauthorized break while riders cooled their heels on the bus.

“There’s a latent demand,” said Webster. “The public wants to talk to us. Management, union, we all need to get out and engage the public more.”

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