“Charter of rights” coming for STM users
City hall opposition has succeeded in persuading council to vote for a charter of rights for STM users, something the CBC newsreader said brightly Wednesday morning would make the users feel more like clients.
Does anyone really think this can be more than PR, obliging the STM to devote time and man-hours to servicing a meaningless concept? The “clients” thing bugs me too, because the STM is not a business. It’s a service. I give the STM the respect to assume it’s doing its best with the resources our society allots to it, given the weather, the traffic and other conditions, so that obliging it to waste its time paying lip service to some bogus “charter of rights” is so far off what’s actually useful that I find it offensive.
The Gazette also has a piece about making buses run on time and the possibility of penalizing the STM if it falls behind. Now I ask you, what the hell good will that do?
jeather 09:55 on 2020-01-29 Permalink
Please, just have the next bus time work on their website correctly and update the twitter accounts in something close to real time. I don’t need penalties. I have, recently, found bus drivers (primarily 24 and 165) to be very polite both to me and to other clients; I never interact with employees on the metro. (Yes, I am a white woman and I am sure this helps.)
Daniel 11:05 on 2020-01-29 Permalink
“Bergeron said future funding of the STM and other operators will be tied to performance.” I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who did a double take when reading this line. I can’t even fathom the thinking behind this madness. Surely poor performance will equal less funding, which will lead to poorer performance?
Kate 11:43 on 2020-01-29 Permalink
No kidding, Daniel.
Ian 13:34 on 2020-01-29 Permalink
Well to be fair it’s a bit tiresome to hear PM going on about how much everything is improving on the STM when those of use who use it know that bus schedules even in rush hour are more of a possibility than a certainty. Yes, I know Coderre messed it all up when he gutted funding, but PM has been in power a long time and it’s still not back to where it was pre-Coderre. Yes, I know there is a lot of construction and cost overruns and unpredictable factors but even the bus drivers have been saying for years that the schedules aren’t realistic, there just aren’t enough working buses and traffic is too bad.
The thing is here, I don’t think it’s the fault of the STM unless someone’s got some insight into deep STM culture … I think this is the city admin offloading responsibility onto the front lines, which is a really unfair move.
Crazy idea but if the goal is just to build goodwill, how about little things like letting people on the bus at the end of the line, especially if the weather is bad? The 80, 51, and 405 are practically training murderers, waiting for the bus to pull up when it’s -20, dark out, windy, and it’s just sitting there 50 feet away idling for 15 minutes…
Don’t even get me started on the light industrial parts of town where the buses simply don’t show up for a half an hour or more even in “rush hour”, especially in winter. Having to walk to a better bus line through the snow in a part of town with no sidewalks is really the worst… and you’re still going to get home late because the stupid bus didn’t show up AGAIN. In some parts of VSL that happens nearly every single day.
Filp 16:32 on 2020-01-29 Permalink
Penalizing transit agencies for traffic would result in massive padding of all bus time tables to make sure no bus is ever “off schedule”. This is not the outcome we want, but it is guaranteed to happen if they get penalized for what is beyond control
Ian 12:18 on 2020-01-30 Permalink
Considering that many routes seem to arbitrarily get cancelled after a certain hour with no warning or indication I’m not sure the STM could pad the schedules enough… but you are right, that is exactly what they will do.
The city needs a special office of scam artists whose only job is to analyze reactionary legislation and figure out how inevitably it will be taken advantage of by the unscrupulous, making things even worse in the long run. An administrative red team, if you will.