I haven’t updated on the recovery-from-eye-surgery front in awhile. Here’s one.
The first week of May, I had to go to the GO area in Union Station to buy a Presto card for the TTC. Why? Because the TTC in its disability-and-poverty-and-non-online-people hating wisdom, haven’t installed machines that take cash. At their in-station Gateways, you can buy with cash a $20 preloaded card – $14 for fares, $6 for card fee. But you can’t reload them at Gateways or their in-station machines with cash. You MUST have a debit or credit card. People use cash for a myriad of reasons, and those who are on the strictest budgets will probably use the TTC over cars and use cash only. But better not to fill all that vast space in their subway station entrances with a large, white Presto machine that takes cash. Much better to hide the tiny card-only green ones in far corners and force us to travel far and into the under-perpetual-construction Union Station GO area. (GO is government of Ontario regional public transit.)
Aside from the problem of getting lost when you have a brain injury, it’s an unnecessarily imperilling and exhausting journey.
Luckily my CNIB orientation mobility trainer knew the way and the station renovators had thoughtfully placed elegant benches here and there. My head felt like it was under pressure. The further we walked, the greater the forces of information overload pushed till I felt like my cranium was being crushed.
I wasn’t ready to enter the busy hub of local, regional, and long-distance rail travel. But the TTC in its quest to be a beacon of accessibility changed one of the subway entrances I use to Presto only, and I only have cash these days. So . . .
The machine was easy to use — because my trainer guided me. I think under normal circumstances, I could’ve figured it out on my own. But then I realized with horror: every time I have to reload this card, I have to come back here!
I can’t on my own!!
The TTC really doesn’t like creating a system that facilitates independence does it? Where is our Mayor? Where is the Ontario Human Rights Commission? Where is the Ontario government to rap their knuckles and inform them that like the London Underground, they must put the Presto machines that take both cash and cards in to every station?
