Please have exact change. Use handrails.
No smoking. Assume the position.

Translink's armed police force assumed their duties this week. Doug McCallum's legacy as Translink Chair making Greater Vancouver home to the only transit security that carries guns in Canada.

Transit Cop proponents claim that rising crime and violence in and around Skytrain stations created the need for the new force. This page is not going to go into statistics other than to say that statistics don't bear out that argument, and that to the best of my knowledge, there has never been a violent incident involving a firearm on board Skytrain.

This page lives near three Skytrain stations (Main Street/Science World, Broadway, and the new VCC/Clark station). From my own observations, 'Crime' around Skytrain stations amounts to marginal drug dealing, panhandling, and handing out copies of Metro: which is a crime against journalism. 'Violence' amounts to the odd harsh utterance or mild shove at someone who doesn't move out of the way of the door, or to the back of a transferring bus to let others board.

The new gun-toting transit force is not borne out of real concern about violent crime, but rather the zero-tolerance, poor-bashing, "safe streets" hysteria which only serves to reinforce the right-wing world view. If the Lower Mainland's law-and-order types really wanted to set up a special police force to go after where the serious violent crime is, why not establish a force to patrol Vancouver's nightclubs? Or would that just upset the hospitality lobby that throws their patrons money behind the NPA, SET, and the BC Liberals?

Pop quiz, hotshots: You're one of the new Skytrain officers. You're on board the Spirit of Kitimat right after leaves Main Street. You see a disheveled man with a glazed look in his eyes drinking a bottle of Dr. Pepper. Maybe he's been doing meth, or maybe he's a diabetic who's had a long day of door-knocking for Stephen Harper. You go over to him and remind about the 'no food or drink rule'. He becomes belligerent, mutters profanities at you, and reaches aggressively into his bag. Is he looking for the bottle cap to reseal his soda, or his 9mm. What do you do?

If that question is too sensational, here's another: does anyone else think it's hypocritical for right-wingers to blast COPE over Vancouver's ethical purchasing policy as the height of political trendiness, then turn around and support transit security getting the trendiest fashion accessory going?