Toronto Is Coping With A Spate Of Violence On Public Transportation.

The public transit system in Toronto has seen an uptick in violent attacks targeting both passengers and operators, making commuters warier of utilizing it. As of Friday, seven violent events have been recorded on the city’s transportation system during the previous seven days.

This includes a woman who was repeatedly stabbed by an unidentified assailant while riding a well-known streetcar in Toronto. The next day, a 16-year-old kid was stabbed in the torso on a bus. Another incident had two teenagers using BB guns to shoot the bus driver. The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) said that two further employees were chased by a guy with a syringe at a subway stop four days later.

Residents have expressed anxiety at the spate of seemingly random violence, which has dominated the discourse in Toronto over the last week.  

In a video posted to TikTok on Thursday, a woman from Toronto said that she “really needs to hide every time I’m on the subway.” Another said, “It’s really worrying; I’m frightened for my safety and (that of) others as well,” according to a local news site called BlogTo.

“I want to feel as comfortable on public transportation as males do.”

The Toronto Police Service replied on Thursday by declaring that it will send extra police to patrol transit hubs. Police Chief Myron Demkiw emphasized that Toronto is still a safe city during the announcement.   He stated that “a million people safely transit our city every day utilizing (TTC) subways, streetcars, and buses.” Recent studies claim that Toronto is not the only city in the world with this issue. New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. are just a few North American cities that have witnessed a spike in violence on the nation’s transportation networks in 2022.

How much has crime increased on public transportation?  

Even while usage is still lower than it was before the epidemic, the Toronto Star newspaper has claimed that violent incidents on the city’s transportation system have increased. The TTC reported 734 incidents of violence against consumers in 2021, up 10% from 2019, including assault, sexual assault, robbery, and harassment. In the first half of 2022, the TTC reported 451 violent occurrences, putting the year on track to have more violent incidents than in 2021. Statistics from the Toronto Police show a 3% increase in serious crime in Toronto overall from 2019.

There also seems to be a rise in violent incidents involving operators. In a recent survey, more than half of the transportation workers in Toronto acknowledged having experienced violence or harassment at work. A task group to address violence against its members has been requested by the national union of transport employees since similar problems have been seen in places like Edmonton and Vancouver. Cities all throughout the US have reported notable increases in crimes on local transportation systems.  

Despite the deployment of hundreds of police officers, records from New York City that were made public in January reveal that subway crime alone increased by 30% in 2022 compared to the previous year. According to data, there are now twice as many violent crimes per million rides in Chicago as there were before the outbreak. In the first 11 months of 2022, there were 591 violent offenses on the city’s Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), up from 489 in the same period the year before. Ridership increased during this period, according to officials, therefore the violent crime rate per million rides actually decreased from 6.8 per million rides to 6.2.

What causes the increase, and what can towns do to combat it?  

Experts have noted that because each violent occurrence is distinct, it is hard to pinpoint exactly what is causing this spike. However, the challenges brought on by the Covid-19 epidemic might be a factor.

Matti Siemiatycki, director of the Infrastructure Institute at the University of Toronto, told the BBC that transit is a microcosm of the city and that “we know that the epidemic shook something loose.”

The TTC reported 451 violent events in the first half of 2022, putting the year on track to have more violent incidents than in 2021. According to data from the Toronto Police, serious crime in Toronto as a whole increased by 3% from 2019.

Additionally, a surge in violent episodes involving operators appears to be occurring. More than half of Toronto’s transportation employees who responded to a recent poll said they had encountered violence or harassment at work. He said that the epidemic has made life extremely difficult for many individuals who have lost their jobs or are trying to make ends meet and that when they come out of seclusion, people are still getting used to socializing with one another again.

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Due to a lack of support elsewhere, Mr. Flores continued, public transportation “serves as a de facto respite site” for persons dealing with anxiety, addiction, and housing instability. Police, he claimed, would not be enough to solve the situation, but he believes that some of the issues with public transit may be resolved if “people’s core needs are met.”

In Chicago, CTA President Dorval Carter made the case that the city’s growing crime rates are at least largely attributable to declining ridership. He lamented the fact that some people felt a little bit freer to engage in bad behavior because there had been fewer passengers utilizing the system for a time.

Several commuters have recommended making bus and subway arrivals more frequent to prevent having to wait alone on platforms and at stations for lengthy periods. Regardless of the answer, Mr. Siemiatycki argued that it is essential for communities to act on this issue. He stated that transit is the “lifeblood of a major city,” connecting people to their homes, places of employment, and wider communities.

“Anything that puts transportation in danger and causes users to second-guess using it poses a real risk to the systems themselves and the wider city as a whole.”