U.S. cities might offer solution to Canadian transit violence

As some major Canadian cities struggle to find ways to respond to escalating violence on their transit systems, some experts say some U-S cities may offer models to help.

Last week, a 17-year-old boy was fatally stabbed on a Vancouver-area bus, and a 16-year-old boy was stabbed to death in an unprovoked attack at a Toronto subway station in March. David Cooper says what’s happening on transit, reflects what’s happening in our cities.

“We’ve had an increase in complexity when it comes to mental health; we’ve have an increase in complexities when it comes to those who are unhoused; we have an increase in complexity when it comes to substance use. These are things that play out in public spaces and unfortunately, at times, public transit is not immune to that,” said David Cooper, founder of Transit Planning Firm Leading Mobility Consulting in Toronto.

Experts, like Cooper, says approaches by some American cities might provide some plausible solutions, the city of Philadelphia and surrounding areas is one of them.

The Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority uses a program called SCOPE. It connects vulnerable residents with social services and involves cooperation with police and social workers.

Cooper says the program provides tools that the transit agency can take, to deal with more of the complexities that are occurring on the system.

“It looks at the safety on the system from increasing visibility; it looks at enhanced cleaning of stations and vehicles; it looks at the ownership of how partnerships need to come help and provide support to vulnerable individuals on the transit system,” said Cooper.

Cooper says he is also looking at models used in Los Angeles and different programs in Calgary, Edmonton, and Toronto. Willem Klumpenhouwer says there is not one perfect solution to fixing this issue.

“My worry, is that quite often with this conversation and this type of issue, solutions come in little bits and that has the risk, of course, of not working because it’s quite not enough,” explained Klumpenhouwer.

ATU Canada President John Di Nino says it’s important for all levels of government, especially Ottawa, to support public transit investments moving forward.

“We need to sit down as a nation, province by province, and figure out some commonalities of why these things are happening and how we deal with societal issues and how that impacts public transit as a whole,” said Di Nino.

“The state of transit is in crisis when it comes to violence, as we are seeing it unfold right across the nation.”

Cooper says the safety of passengers is top of mind.

“It is vital from the perspective of the agencies that customers feel safe and it is very loud and clear of the importance of that.”