The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) has announced the deployment of 80 additional employees to help counter the sharp increase in violent incidents the public carrier has been experiencing in recent days.
The announcement came on the sidelines of a news conference Friday attended by Mayor John Tory, TTC chief executive Rick Leary, chief executive officer Jon Burnside and city police chief executive officer Myron Demkiw.
Officers are tasked with regularly patrolling the subway, bus lines and trams during rush hour. These agents will also be “very noticeable” to users, the CTT explained.
“The TTC needs to be safe for everyone – passengers and staff,” Mayor Tory said, according to The Toronto Star. “We continue to work with the TTC, the Toronto Police Department and others [les différents syndicats] to ensure we respond to inquiries as quickly as possible.”
As for Police Commissioner Myron Demkiw, he specifically stressed that safety is the police’s “top priority” right now.
There has been a sharp increase in violent incidents on Toronto’s public transit system. The city has been able to count at least one every day for the past week, which worries many users.
Last Saturday, two teenagers shot a bus driver with an airgun. A group of teenagers attacked two employees on a bus on Monday. A woman was stabbed in the face and head on a tram on Tuesday. On Wednesday, a teenager suffered serious injuries after being stabbed on a bus. Four teenagers fired airguns at a woman on the subway on Thursday. And on Friday, a man on a bus was attacked by a group of people while another was pushed down the stairs of a subway station.
The CTT says it is committed to training its employees to try to prevent these types of incidents to ensure the safety and well-being of employees and customers using this mode of transport.