I am a born and raised in Toronto, and have been a long time subscriber and viewer of your channel. I would have preferred to maybe e-mail you this instead, but I was not able to find any e-mail address other than the one you have listed on YouTube for business inquiries, so I decided to just write this to you here, I hope you don't mind.
First of all, you have NOT in any way failed this city, so please don't give yourself this negative talk. You have simply died on a hill that many other transit experts and consultants have died on before you, but I don't mean to add to your negativity. The mistake that everyone makes is that they think that because their ideas are good then this means that the TTC should listen to them. What people don't realize is that the TTC is mainly run by Torontonians, and we don't listen to good ideas. We listen to very assertive leadership, the loudest person in the room or someone that just refuses to be ignored.
If you want to be heard by the TTC then what you need to do is go down to TTC headquarters at Davisville in person and be polite but very assertive about talking to the person you want to and telling them what you want to tell them. You need to push your way through and NOT take no or the run around for an answer. They will then be very happy to be receptive to you. Sending e-mails, having a great YouTube channel and asking them to please listen to you may work in other places in Canada, but it is not how we get things done here in Toronto.
On the other hand though, I want to point out that it is not clear to me exactly what you want from the TTC. I have read your posts about it and watched your videos about this topic. You talk about being acknowledged, invited to behind the scenes things and you having good ideas for them to improve their transit system. But what it is exactly that you want from them? Do you want them to say hi to you, is there a specific thing you want to see or go to, is there an idea that you have that you want them to implement? I don't mean to sound facetious but it is really not clear to me exactly what it is you want from them.
People in Toronto are pretty sinical and the TTC is never going to randomly reach out to you. If there is something that you want then you need to be specific and pursue this to the end. Then you can use that as a starting point for your relationship with them, which will be a slow one step at a time kind of thing. Sorry if I come across a bit critical, but I am just trying to help you.
The short of it is this, you need to be a Vancouverite that has now become a Torontonian, not a Vancouverite that found himself in Toronto because he went to University here.
Love the channel and the content, and will always be a supporter.
I just wanted to drop a bit about property taxes... Did you mean land use taxes instead? We don't want parking lots taking important and valuable space!
Your point about transit expansion being designed from a car-driving perspective in the GTA is so true. Despite the massive GO expansion project, there's been almost no expansion of GO's bus services and there doesn't seem to be any discussion of their value. GO Trains serve people with access to car, but who don't want to face traffic going downtown, GO Buses serve people without access to a car who need to make longer trips around the region.
I grew up in Kitchener and now live in London, England (real London according to Not Just Bikes). When I was growing up, there was an express Greyhound bus to downtown Toronto every hour or two throughout the day, including on weekends. It gradually got less express over the final few years, and Greyhound had some real issues with customer service and reliability, but it was an ok option for people to travel to downtown Toronto who didn't have access to a car. Now there is no direct transit service from Kitchener to downtown Toronto on the weekend at all. There's a (very slow) GO Bus service to Square One, which means you have to change onto another bus to get to Union, and the whole process takes between two and a half and three hours. If you have a car, you can get to downtown Toronto in one to one and a half hours. Given the population of Kitchener-Waterloo and the expansion of its local transit system and its LRT, an express off peak and weekend bus from Kitchener to Union (or at least to a subway station) seems obvious to me. But I suppose it wouldn't seem obvious to someone for whom the only disincentive to driving is rush hour traffic.
In the UK it's relatively easy to get nearly anywhere without a car (though services are often more limited on Sundays). It can definitely be frustrating and expensive dealing with buses outside of London, but the only places where you'd be totally unable to get around without a car are very remote places like the Scottish Highlands and the Peak District - and even those places often have trains and buses serving the most popular tourist attractions. I'd suggest moving to London, but I think Geoff Marshall and the many other rail and transit youtubers have it all sewn up. But definitely don't move to Kitchener!
Without more service to suburban GO stations the benefits of GO Expansion will be lost, because while Toronto has the service it still has a completely antiquated fare system!
As a native of Ottawa, I'm not sure if I would recommend it from a transit perspective. There is essentially no regional transit to smaller hubs outside the city, like Toronto has with GO Transit. The air connections are also far worse than you would expect for a city of its size, due to Montreal and Toronto being major nearby hubs. So if you want to travel anywhere internationally, you will most likely find yourself having to spend an hour hanging around YYZ, YUL or a nearby US airport.
Certainly it's a more manageable size than Toronto, but the rents are still ridiculous. And the city council is beholden to developers who dream of unlimited sprawl. Ottawa talks big, but in reality it still thinks of itself as a small town. Also, it's very cold in the winter - but that goes without saying.
I live in NYC but my team has members in Toronto and soon in CDMX and I'm considering moving south because I'm the lone member in NY for the cost savings and the better weather.
Hi Reece,
I am a born and raised in Toronto, and have been a long time subscriber and viewer of your channel. I would have preferred to maybe e-mail you this instead, but I was not able to find any e-mail address other than the one you have listed on YouTube for business inquiries, so I decided to just write this to you here, I hope you don't mind.
First of all, you have NOT in any way failed this city, so please don't give yourself this negative talk. You have simply died on a hill that many other transit experts and consultants have died on before you, but I don't mean to add to your negativity. The mistake that everyone makes is that they think that because their ideas are good then this means that the TTC should listen to them. What people don't realize is that the TTC is mainly run by Torontonians, and we don't listen to good ideas. We listen to very assertive leadership, the loudest person in the room or someone that just refuses to be ignored.
If you want to be heard by the TTC then what you need to do is go down to TTC headquarters at Davisville in person and be polite but very assertive about talking to the person you want to and telling them what you want to tell them. You need to push your way through and NOT take no or the run around for an answer. They will then be very happy to be receptive to you. Sending e-mails, having a great YouTube channel and asking them to please listen to you may work in other places in Canada, but it is not how we get things done here in Toronto.
On the other hand though, I want to point out that it is not clear to me exactly what you want from the TTC. I have read your posts about it and watched your videos about this topic. You talk about being acknowledged, invited to behind the scenes things and you having good ideas for them to improve their transit system. But what it is exactly that you want from them? Do you want them to say hi to you, is there a specific thing you want to see or go to, is there an idea that you have that you want them to implement? I don't mean to sound facetious but it is really not clear to me exactly what it is you want from them.
People in Toronto are pretty sinical and the TTC is never going to randomly reach out to you. If there is something that you want then you need to be specific and pursue this to the end. Then you can use that as a starting point for your relationship with them, which will be a slow one step at a time kind of thing. Sorry if I come across a bit critical, but I am just trying to help you.
The short of it is this, you need to be a Vancouverite that has now become a Torontonian, not a Vancouverite that found himself in Toronto because he went to University here.
Love the channel and the content, and will always be a supporter.
I just wanted to drop a bit about property taxes... Did you mean land use taxes instead? We don't want parking lots taking important and valuable space!
I mean, I was mainly referring to the existing tax structure in TO - in reference to property taxes.
Your point about transit expansion being designed from a car-driving perspective in the GTA is so true. Despite the massive GO expansion project, there's been almost no expansion of GO's bus services and there doesn't seem to be any discussion of their value. GO Trains serve people with access to car, but who don't want to face traffic going downtown, GO Buses serve people without access to a car who need to make longer trips around the region.
I grew up in Kitchener and now live in London, England (real London according to Not Just Bikes). When I was growing up, there was an express Greyhound bus to downtown Toronto every hour or two throughout the day, including on weekends. It gradually got less express over the final few years, and Greyhound had some real issues with customer service and reliability, but it was an ok option for people to travel to downtown Toronto who didn't have access to a car. Now there is no direct transit service from Kitchener to downtown Toronto on the weekend at all. There's a (very slow) GO Bus service to Square One, which means you have to change onto another bus to get to Union, and the whole process takes between two and a half and three hours. If you have a car, you can get to downtown Toronto in one to one and a half hours. Given the population of Kitchener-Waterloo and the expansion of its local transit system and its LRT, an express off peak and weekend bus from Kitchener to Union (or at least to a subway station) seems obvious to me. But I suppose it wouldn't seem obvious to someone for whom the only disincentive to driving is rush hour traffic.
In the UK it's relatively easy to get nearly anywhere without a car (though services are often more limited on Sundays). It can definitely be frustrating and expensive dealing with buses outside of London, but the only places where you'd be totally unable to get around without a car are very remote places like the Scottish Highlands and the Peak District - and even those places often have trains and buses serving the most popular tourist attractions. I'd suggest moving to London, but I think Geoff Marshall and the many other rail and transit youtubers have it all sewn up. But definitely don't move to Kitchener!
Without more service to suburban GO stations the benefits of GO Expansion will be lost, because while Toronto has the service it still has a completely antiquated fare system!
As a native of Ottawa, I'm not sure if I would recommend it from a transit perspective. There is essentially no regional transit to smaller hubs outside the city, like Toronto has with GO Transit. The air connections are also far worse than you would expect for a city of its size, due to Montreal and Toronto being major nearby hubs. So if you want to travel anywhere internationally, you will most likely find yourself having to spend an hour hanging around YYZ, YUL or a nearby US airport.
Certainly it's a more manageable size than Toronto, but the rents are still ridiculous. And the city council is beholden to developers who dream of unlimited sprawl. Ottawa talks big, but in reality it still thinks of itself as a small town. Also, it's very cold in the winter - but that goes without saying.
I live in NYC but my team has members in Toronto and soon in CDMX and I'm considering moving south because I'm the lone member in NY for the cost savings and the better weather.