evandyk
Senior Member
I've been getting it through Amazon Prime streaming too. It basically alternates between this and an ad for a Wendy’s sandwich with Takis inside.
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Mayor Olivia Chow's Toronto
- Thread starter DSCToronto
- Start date
DSCToronto
Superstar
Member Bio
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News Release
August 1, 2025
City of Toronto celebrates graduation of 40 new Traffic Agents to enhance congestion management
Today, the City of Toronto welcomed 40 new Traffic Agents who will support the City's efforts to manage traffic congestion and keep Toronto moving.
The new graduates completed a comprehensive training program and were recently appointed as Special Constables by the Toronto Police Services Board, empowering them to actively manage traffic under the Highway Traffic Act.
Traffic Agents are a critical part of Toronto’s Congestion Management Plan (https://can01.safelinks.protection....pRJ4BONv9U9YtO7vnoGxSVpxXlr2Djpww=&reserved=0) and play a key role in managing traffic congestion by:
- preventing drivers from blocking intersections (“blocking the box”),
- encouraging pedestrians not to cross when the pedestrian signal displays the red hand,
- ensuring cyclists follow the rules of the road, and
- discouraging drivers from illegally stopping or parking including for deliveries or passenger pick-up and drop-off.
The City now has 60 Traffic Agents who are deployed to some of Toronto’s most congested intersections during the morning and afternoon peak periods to manage the safe movement of vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians.
More Traffic Agents are currently completing their training and the City is on target to reach its goal of 100 Traffic Agents by the end of the year.
Additional information about the Traffic Agent program is available on the City’s website: https://can01.safelinks.protection....WcODrWFr5yph3OndRW09EzXAGegKwDNNI=&reserved=0
August 1, 2025
City of Toronto celebrates graduation of 40 new Traffic Agents to enhance congestion management
Today, the City of Toronto welcomed 40 new Traffic Agents who will support the City's efforts to manage traffic congestion and keep Toronto moving.
The new graduates completed a comprehensive training program and were recently appointed as Special Constables by the Toronto Police Services Board, empowering them to actively manage traffic under the Highway Traffic Act.
Traffic Agents are a critical part of Toronto’s Congestion Management Plan (https://can01.safelinks.protection....pRJ4BONv9U9YtO7vnoGxSVpxXlr2Djpww=&reserved=0) and play a key role in managing traffic congestion by:
- preventing drivers from blocking intersections (“blocking the box”),
- encouraging pedestrians not to cross when the pedestrian signal displays the red hand,
- ensuring cyclists follow the rules of the road, and
- discouraging drivers from illegally stopping or parking including for deliveries or passenger pick-up and drop-off.
The City now has 60 Traffic Agents who are deployed to some of Toronto’s most congested intersections during the morning and afternoon peak periods to manage the safe movement of vehicles, cyclists and pedestrians.
More Traffic Agents are currently completing their training and the City is on target to reach its goal of 100 Traffic Agents by the end of the year.
Additional information about the Traffic Agent program is available on the City’s website: https://can01.safelinks.protection....WcODrWFr5yph3OndRW09EzXAGegKwDNNI=&reserved=0
Jonny5
Senior Member
"Discouraging" is an interesting word there. I assume that ultimately means they cannot really do anything about it other than flag a police officer down if available, so the ride share drivers will learn to simply ignore the Traffic Agents, or tell them flat out they don't care, then I suspect the Traffic Agents will quickly become apathetic to that scenario and stop bothering to even try to "discourage" at all, and focus on other things they can actually do.
zang
Senior Member
Seriously, they could park one at Church & Bloor permanently, thanks.
That's one of the worst corners in the north side of Downtown. A year ago, when my daughter was old enough to walk herself to school, I told her to be very careful of that corner. There's always a driver doing something dangerous or illegal there.
A year later (and note, I walk through that intersection every day, often multiple times), and I've yet to be wrong. If it isn't blocking the box, it's running a red, blocking crosswalks, ignoring pedestrian advances, cutting off cyclists… You name it, a driver will do it.
zang
Senior Member
Pretty sure "Special Constable" means they have the right to issue tickets.
guavadelic
Active Member
Column from TVO relaying findings from a CivicAction report that outlines how workers are being priced out of Toronto...
In addition to shedding light on well-known cost drivers of housing (lengthy planning processes, large development charges, etc), the report also examines the possibility of governments encouraging public and private pensions to make more patient capital available to residential developers so that new homes don't need to offer the highest possible financial returns.
https://www.tvo.org/article/analysis-workers-are-being-priced-out-of-toronto-can-we-reverse-course
In addition to shedding light on well-known cost drivers of housing (lengthy planning processes, large development charges, etc), the report also examines the possibility of governments encouraging public and private pensions to make more patient capital available to residential developers so that new homes don't need to offer the highest possible financial returns.
Admiral Beez
Superstar
What we need is a public enforcement system. Since there is zero allowed reason to be illegally stopping or parking including for deliveries or passenger pick-up and drop-off, anyone with the relevant TPS app should be able to photo and upload the scofflaw's details.
T3G
Senior Member
I don't really think promoting vigilante justice is in the best interests of our city.
Northern Light
Superstar
The TVO piece itself isn't bad, as far as it goes, but avoids actually addressing the issues head-on for the most part.
When you combine it with the underlying reports from Civic Action, its better.
They accurately address that if you did everything on every developer's dream list, you would barely make a dent in middle-class affordability and none at all in lower middle and low income affordability.
While this certainly highlights the need for additional rent-geared-to-income housing, there is simply no way to build enough to meet demand over the next decade and probably not the next two.
They then mention income supports, which are certainly part of the question too.
But they give short shrift to the fact that lower tier wages must rise, substantially.
Whereas the studies show, if you don't earn at least $52,000, roughly $26 per hour, you can't be housed in market housing, and that can be the case for people earning up to 2x that if single, or having to cover costs of a child/dependent etc.
In light of that, a minimum wage of under $18 per hour is literally insane.
Raising the wage to $26 may not be feasible, at least in the near term; but getting it to $22 is surely essential.
We need policy actions that are comparatively quick and easy to do, and ideally not too costly.
On Social Assistance, as meager as the rates are, ($733 per month for Ontario Works to meet all your needs) even doubling them doesn't connect people to market housing.
Which is not an argument against a substantial increase, but suggests that won't be a big part of the answer, and it will be hugely expensive.
What we could do quickly is:
1) Stop telling people how to to spend their OW payment (shelter vs other living expenses) and let people spend it how they need to.
2) Stop penalizing people on assistance who get a job............if you earn as little as $200 per month, your payment is reduced by .50c for each dollar you earn. That's punishing people for trying.
Income should be calculated quarterly or annually, not monthly. On an annual basis there should be no clawback until you exceed $20,000 in earnings ($5,000 per quarter)
The clawback rate should be reduced to no more than .40c on the dollar, and maybe less for the first $10,000 (say..30c) so that work pays.
***
The report also notes that we continue to have a problem with poverty among the elderly/retiree group, notwithstanding that this is our wealthiest cohort.
A low-income earning senior, reliant on GIS, may get only $2,000 per month in total support. Given what housing costs in Toronto, that doesn't work either. But we can't raise taxes infinitely, and this means we must clawback OAS from high income earners and give that money to low-income seniors instead.
Civic Action Report, here:
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Admiral Beez
Superstar
just east of the creek
Senior Member
Toronto could be looking at other large cities around the world for models as most larger cities struggle with this same problem. London is one. Paris another. UT keeps touching on these problems in various threads, and there are solutions, but the political action needs to match the political rhetoric, and the pol;itial action needs backbone. One good example would be the recent and ongoing six plex discussion (and council vote) and the strong mayor powers that the mayor of toronto refuses to use to enact reforms that would benefit those at lower income levels who live (or wish to live) and work in the city.
As I've noted before, only semi tongue in cheek, I believe that any mayor with strong mayor powers, should immediately enact zoning changes to enable by right any lot containing a back split or side split single family or duplex dwelling to be rezoned for a four plex or six plex with all the good design features we wish - set backs, transit proximity, parking controls, bike lockers, environmental i.e. energy retention and generatio, design features for seniors on ground floors etc
Towered
Superstar
How are they supposed to pick up riders?
Admiral Beez
Superstar
That’s called problem transference. Someone wants to be dropped off or picked up, and in their mind there is no where that is both legal and convenient, so they transfer their problem to the rest of us, blocking traffic as a result. The best way to avoid problem transference is to ask yourself, what impact are my choices having on others. If I am late for work (my problem) because of traffic or just poor personal planning, then my colleagues must then pickup the slack, transferring my problem to them. A more pertinent example: say your business needs to shred a lot of documents but you don’t have a large size shredder on site (problem), so you hire a mobile shredding truck that blocks a lane of rush hour traffic outside your office, thus offloading the problem to everyone else.
guavadelic
Active Member
Agreed. Even though many large cities share the problem of housing affordability, most of them use their residential land more efficiently than Toronto. Until recently, around 70 per cent of Toronto’s residential land was zoned only for detached single-family homes whereas most global cities with larger populations allow denser housing in majority of their residential land.
Recent zoning reforms should help but still a long way to go.
Towered
Superstar
If a rider is dumb or entitled enough to request a pick up at say, Yonge and Bloor, where there is no place for a driver to stop without blocking a lane of traffic or a bike lane, that's on the rider.
So what's the solution to these scenarios?
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