Essential services

On the morning of Monday, April 23, one of the news stories on the radio was that the students of Virginia Tech were returning to class. Apparently classes had been suspended since the shooting, and students also had the option either completing their semester, or taking whatever their current mark was and leaving for the rest of the semester. I remember thinking that was very civilized, and reflecting wistfully on the flexibility of academia.

Then it was time to head out to work. There had just been an accident where a TTC worker was killed, the subway was offline for my entire commute. The TTC was out in full force trying to cover for the outage. Every available single bus (including these really old retro buses) was being used to shuttle passengers along the subway routes. There were transit supervisors everywhere directing people. Basically everyone in the entire system was going full throttle to make sure the city keeps moving.

Despite the fact that the two situations are very different, the contrast nevertheless really struck me. At Virginia Tech they get the time and flexibility they need to recover a bit, while the TTC people have to jump right into work full throttle without missing a beat.

I hope the general public keeps this in mind next time they're inclined to get all bitchy at the TTC because it pays some of its workers over $20/hour.