Teens pushed on to subway tracks at Dufferin

[RedRocket191]

It's obviously not a "lets drop everything and do this now" idea, but there's enough justification to put money into it over time.

 

[Railization]

Part of the argument for building the DRL now instead of later is to save the $2+B that would have been spent on useless frills like platform doors, frills that are only needed to push capacity beyond a peak point peak hour load of 28K.

We can't have a knee-jerk reaction to every incident at platform level. People getting pushed onto the tracks is rare. Suicides are more common, but platform doors wouldn't eliminate those anyway, as I've already mentioned at least one site that could still be available to them, and I can think of others, too. Better garbage collection practices and a greater presence of garbage/recycling bins would keep track-fires under control.

If the aim is not to boost capacity beyond 28K pphpd, we do not need platform doors. It's better to spend the money on building relief lines since the cost is about the same and relief lines create more service.

 

[RedRocket191]

Is a half-dozen (or so) knee-jerk reactions in as many years still a knee-jerk reaction? I would call it a mounting pile of evidence...

 

[Railization]

Once a year is still rare. If it becomes a monthly occurence, OK, sure, then it's a problem. It comes back to the airport-security comment I made, since we've had two attempted murders in the subway station in as many months.

 

[RedRocket191]

Once a year is still rare. If it becomes a monthly occurence, OK, sure, then it's a problem. It comes back to the airport-security comment I made, since we've had two attempted murders in the subway station in as many months.

While the TTC does not publish stats on suicide attempts, most anecdotes I have heard puts it at or greater than once a month.

From Suicide & Mental Health Association International:

Every day, Wayne Moore hopes it won't happen again. In his 28 years as a TTC subway operator, he's been involved in 13 subway suicides. In 1999 alone, three people were crushed by Moore's train. While the first incident involved a man who fell to the track after suffering a heart attack, the second and third were suicides, leaving Moore so badly shaken he needed muscle relaxants to sleep. "But other drivers have had it worse," he says. "Some have seen as many as 25 or 26 suicides in a 30-year career."

Although the exact number is unclear, Bruce Bryer, a TTC ticket agent for 23 years, says that on average one person jumps every week. "Something needs to be done, because we can't ignore it any longer," he says.

TTC media relations officer Marilyn Bolton won't confirm the number of suicides, for fear, she says, of glamourizing the idea. She has a point, says Paul Links, chair of suicide studies at the U of T. "There is significant evidence that reporting on individual suicides can put vulnerable people at risk and lead to copycat suicides."

 

[Railization]

You were talking about people being pushed onto tracks, and I was talking about people being shot/stabbed in the system. Suicides are different - I already knew those were, on average, a weekly occurence. Like I already said though, there are a large number of areas across the system where it is possible to throw yourself in front of a train. Platform doors won't do anything to deter the determined suicidals.

 

[RedRocket191]

Actually, I was and have always been speaking about both situations. Nothing will stop the most determined people, but it can do two things:

1) reduce or eliminate the effects upon greater society by preventing anyone from falling, actively or passively onto the tracks

2) if taking one's own life is more difficult to do, then perhaps the family members will have more time to notice the warning signs and get people help.

 

[AKS]

I don't get it. You call the extra set of doors a frill. Of course is to prevent people from jumping or being pushed onto the tracks. The second set of doors won't help prevent shooting or stabbing. The thread here is about "being pushed onto the tracks"

It's a frill. People being deliberately pushed onto subway tracks is extremely rare (and thank heavens for that). Where there's a will, there's a way. Somebody will always find some way to throw someone in front of a train. Ellis Portal comes to mind (just north of Bloor station). It's a useless expense because people will just find another way to accomplish the same thing.

 

[Ruddy Ruddy]

You were talking about people being pushed onto tracks, and I was talking about people being shot/stabbed in the system. Suicides are different - I already knew those were, on average, a weekly occurence. Like I already said though, there are a large number of areas across the system where it is possible to throw yourself in front of a train. Platform doors won't do anything to deter the determined suicidals.

Maybe they won't, but they'll cut down on impulsive suicides. Yes, there will still be plenty of areas across the system where people can throw themselves in front of trains, but they'll have to be determined enough to actually leave a station and seek out one of these places, during which time there would be ample opportunity for second thoughts.

And they won't be able to do it in front of a station of horrified onlookers either. That's good just from the standpoint of the spectators, but it also reduces the options available to someone attempting a very public suicide.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Here's how this latest incident will play out in the justice system....the accused will have the attempted murder charges dropped, and then face assault charges, which will then be dropped because the courts will determine that he's got some mental defect, couldn't understand what he was doing, etc...

 

[Observer Walt]

Apparently he was ordered to have a psychiatric examination. I wouldn't care too much about the technicalities of what happens to him, as long as he is kept in some kind of secure facility (prison or psych. hospital) and away from the subway.

 

[Railization]

Actually, I was and have always been speaking about both situations. Nothing will stop the most determined people, but it can do two things:

1) reduce or eliminate the effects upon greater society by preventing anyone from falling, actively or passively onto the tracks

2) if taking one's own life is more difficult to do, then perhaps the family members will have more time to notice the warning signs and get people help.

I think we'd get the same benefit by having a faster clean-up system. I know that GO Transit has been looking for ways to speed up the process for collisions with its trains.

I've been on a train that hit somebody in Tokyo. 20 minutes later, the train was moving again. If we had a system where we got the body off the tracks, checked the brakes and other mechanical components for damage from the collision, and whiped up any mess, in a quick and efficient manner, then the delays wouldn't be as severe.

If we apply the methods used in the Japanese system where the family of the victim is charged a fine for the service disruptions caused by the suicide, then the costs of such disruptions to the system are re-couped and people will think twice about committing suicide that way because of the financial burden they'd place on their families.

Cold? Yes, but it's effective, and we need something that is effective both in results and in cost. Platform doors are far too expensive a solution for what we're talking about. Since we're not creating new service with platform doors, the costs would never be re-couped. And suicides would still happen around Rosedale, Davisville, Warden-VP, Kipling-Islington, Keele, etc., there's no lack of places it can happen.

 

[nfitz]

If we apply the methods used in the Japanese system where the family of the victim is charged a fine for the service disruptions caused by the suicide, then the costs of such disruptions to the system are re-couped and people will think twice about committing suicide that way because of the financial burden they'd place on their families.

Perhaps it's for idiotic reasons like this that the Japanese suicide rate is so much higher than ours.

Why would anyone suggest such a thing? Why not just take a gun and start shooting people instead?

 

[Railization]

Perhaps it's for idiotic reasons like this that the Japanese suicide rate is so much higher than ours.

Why would anyone suggest such a thing? Why not just take a gun and start shooting people instead?

The suicide rate is related to a lot of things, which I could get into but it's off-topic. You seem to have this bizzarre idea that all suicides in Japan are done by throwing themselves in front of trains. Maybe you should think a little before making accusations of what's idiotic.

 

[ganjavih]

Here's how this latest incident will play out in the justice system....the accused will have the attempted murder charges dropped, and then face assault charges, which will then be dropped because the courts will determine that he's got some mental defect, couldn't understand what he was doing, etc...

Based on the randomness of the act, and the way he was behaving before, I would guess he's probably insane.