How to attract tourism...?

[lordshipmayhem]

So this is one of the busiest weekends for tourism in Toronto: the wrap-up to Gay Pride Week, the Gay Pride Parade. It's been a week when Toronto wants to look its best, to hopefully bring those tourists (and tourist dollar$) back not just for next year, but for other occasions during the intervening 12 months. We have a million tourists in the city right now, hopefully having a wonderful time.

And what happens? A chunk of concrete falls from the roof of a stretch of the Yonge/University/Spadina line, closes part of the subway line feeding the parade route, necessitating "emergency repairs" (to use the cute phrase used by the Toronto Transit Commission, or TTC) and forcing riders to rely on overworked, over-capacity shuttle buses between the two affected stations. It also slows the trains on the rest of the line down to a crawl. All of this at a time when we're recommending to those million or so tourists that they use public transit.

Yes, everyone, come to Toronto. Marvel at our quaint, ancient, charmingly decrepit subway system. Bring a hard hat and a sturdy pair of steel-toed work boots. *sigh*

Comments

[musicgeekstress.livejournal.com]

That is just embarrassing!

I was on the subway on Thursday morning trying to get to an 11am appointment at College and Bay. The subway slowed to a stop between Lawrence and Eglinton though where we were informed that there was no more service after Eglinton up to Union and that we would have to take the shuttle. It was already 5 to 11 when we finally got to Eglinton and all I found at the bus terminal was a horrid mass of people and one bus. I figured there was no point in pursuing my appointment since by the time I'd get there it would be over, so I headed by North and by the time I reached Sheppard an announcement came over the speaker saying that all service had returned. I think I kind of punched the seat beside me. Despite my frustration I decided to head back down again, making it in 40 minutes late, but making it nonetheless.

There were theories floating around that someone jumped the tracks, but does that usually slow down service between several stations? I never found out what caused it.

[lordshipmayhem.livejournal.com]

No service for that stretch of stations is highly unusual - of course that doesn't mean they won't tell us anything, of course. ("Everything's normal! We believe Torontonians WANT this level of service!")

I'm glad you at least got to where you were going, even if it was 40 minutes late. ^_^