It started with a simple question: “Why are you late?”

It ended with a standoff between passengers and TTC officials on a crowded streetcar at Bathurst station at the height of rush hour that was only resolved by police intervention.

The melee started around 5 p.m. Monday when a middle-aged woman, who didn’t want to be named on advice from her lawyer, was waiting for streetcar at Bathurst station. One finally arrived 40 minutes later.

“Why are you late?” she recalls asking the operator. “We’ve been waiting for almost 40 minutes now.”

“I don’t like your attitude and you are not getting into my car,” she remembers the operator saying, before he left the streetcar for a short break.

Having none of it, the woman hopped on and sat near the front. When the operator returned five minutes later, he spotted her and yelled at her to “get out of his car,” she said.

“I said no, I have a subway pass and paid my fare.”

The driver told her to get off and take the next one, but the woman refused to budge.

“I wasn’t backing down,” the woman said. And she didn’t. Neither did the other passengers nor the TTC.

Abie Derdak, another passenger on the streetcar, overheard the back-and-forth, but couldn’t make out the words. But the tone wasn’t abrasive, she said.

“The driver was so angry and out of his mind,” said Julio Erhart, who sat at the front.

Other passengers piped up, telling the operator everyone has a right to free speech.

The operator then called his supervisor, following TTC protocol, because he apparently felt threatened.

Then it got ugly. One woman, known only as Shari, filmed part of the fracas, which Citytv obtained.

“We can all sit here forever, or you can come out, let the streetcar go and then I’ll get you on another streetcar,” a supervisor who arrived on scene told the woman. She refused.

Nearby passengers argued back. Then the supervisor noticed Shari’s camera, marched up the stairs and placed his hand over it.

It isn’t clear what happened next. TTC spokesman Brad Ross said the supervisor didn’t take the camera, but pushed it down “in an attempt to defuse the situation.”

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It isn’t illegal to take pictures or record video on TTC property as long as it is not for commercial purposes, said Ross.

But the TTC does ask that passengers not do so.

Then, Ross said, an elderly passenger grabbed the supervisor from behind in a bearhug.

“I didn’t see a bearhug,” the woman said. “The driver grabbed the camera and then another man grabbed his arm and took it away.”

That’s when the standoff began. Many of the passengers refused to disembark, but TTC officials weren’t moving the streetcar, which created a convoy of other streetcars behind it. About 50 passengers waited another 30 minutes while TTC officials stood on the platform awaiting police. They arrived and the situation was resolved without any charges being laid.

The incident has renewed tensions between riders and TTC employees after a brief respite following public outrage over photos showing some workers sleeping on the job that surfaced online about 18 months ago.

Drivers have the right to refuse service, according to Ross and Bob Kinnear, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union.

Kinnear said TTC workers can snap after a long day, but most are courteous.

“There were many times I’d come home and say to myself I could have handled an incident better,” said Kinnear, who drove TTC vehicles for 10 years. “But the job is really stressful.”

According to Ross, an average of two TTC employees are assaulted daily on the job. The rate has remained steady over the past few years.

“I’m not making excuses,” Kinnear said. “But people must remember that we’re human beings too.”