AMPUS NEWS sores THE VOICE, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2011 3 Students feel safe on board city buses Despite more altercations being reported in 2011, Langara students still feel safe while riding transit By DEVON MACKENZIE despite recent concerns of bus driv- ers being assaulted by citizens. Vancouver bus drivers are calling for increased transit police patrols after 150 reported attacks on drivers within the past year. “Generally I feel pretty safe,” said general studies student Helen Cheung, who added even late night bus rides pose little concern. Cheung said any unsafe feelings were experienced while waiting at bus stops — something she feels additional transit police presence on buses wouldn’t help. “Sometimes it just makes a differ- ence if there’s more people around,” she said. Tim Carlson, a student in Langara’s Studio 58 program said he never feels unsafe on transit but he does have con- cerns about altercations between males on buses. “A lot of the time women are seen as the ones who might get harassed but it’s more just like a comment in pass- ing,” Carlson said. “I think a lot of males are in danger of becoming a part of an altercation ... because they tend to mouth-off to each other more.” Carlson said increased patrol on transit could help curb bus brawls. But he added the incidents he’s been in- volved in have never gone beyond ver- bal exchanges. TransLink’s public information offi- cer Drew Snider said he believes TransLink’s efforts to up safety on main bus routes have helped in mini- mizing altercations that happen on board buses. He also noted both rider- ship and assaults on board transit are up in the last year. “T know there’s been a bit of an in- crease in assault incidents, but we also have to be aware that there’s been an increase in ridership. We’re currently running ahead of last years ridership, even with the Olympics in 2010.” Transit police reported 1,405 as- saults in 2010, a 25 per cent increase from 2009 that saw 1,128 assaults. Transit police weren’t able to com- ment on future plans, but Snider said it’s only logical that more people on board and more service hours means there’s more opportunity for incidents. “Just about every bus out of the Van- couver transit centre, which includes most of the buses that serve Langara, are now equipped with video cameras which capture events on board,” Snider said. His tips for staying safe on transit if you feel uncomfortable included sitting or standing as close to the front of the bus as possible. He also said to make sure you notify the nearest driver or transit authority if you feel the slight- est discomfort about something, and staying in the on-camera areas. — | = ae Liss students feel safe on transit DEVON MACKENZIE photo Vancouver bus drivers are calling for increased transit police patrols. Const. Steve Addison, who graduated from Langara’s journalism program, live- tweeted his stories while patrolling the streets of the Downtown Eas- tide yesterday from 3 p.m. when he began his shift. MATT HYNDMAN photo -_, is VPD cop tweet — - i ~t s from streets of city's Downtown Eastside Langara grad Cont. Steve Addison live-tweeted his day on the job By SHAWN GILL onst. Steve Addison of the Van- couver Police live-tweeted from his foot patrol of the Downtown Eastside during his shift last night. He used his tweets to shine a lit on what its like for a beat cop on a chal- lenging beat. “It’s easy to see the problems down here as being really black and white,” said Addison in an interview last week. “But when you get down here you re- alize that it’s more complicated than that.” On Wednesday at 5 p.m. he tweeted: “Just nabbed a shoplifter with a stolen hat stuffed in his pants. Says he was gonna sell it for food. Sad.” Earlier he wrote: “Drunk guy passed out on wet sidewalk. 6 people watching, but nobody helping. Church staff took him in.” The VPD hopes that the public will benefit from its use of social media to tell the story of what a beat cop sees and whom they interact with during their daily duties, said Const. Lindsey Houghton, a media spokesperson for the VPD. Addison, a Langara journalism grad, has been at the forefront of the VPD’s engagement with the media since he started his blog Eastside Stories, Diary of a Vancouver Beat Cop in September. Addison said that the DTES, which has always been a very complex and challenging part of the city, is worse now than it was 35 years ago. “Things have gotten worse in the sense that people are sicker” Addison said. Among the street population in the DTES, the prevalence of HIV/AIDS and an epidemic of hepatitis C having con- tributed to worsening conditions as has “a big increase in the DTES of peo- ple who are mentally ill [due de-institu- tionalization],” Addison said. “Now we’re dealing with people who are psychotic and unpredictable be- cause of their mental illness not just because of drugs,” Addison said. Addison and the seven other officers who police the DTES respond to to- day’s challenges by helping the people they can help. “Some people don’t want help,” Ad- dison said, one of the biggest problems facing the DTES is that victims of crimes are afraid to speak out. Darrell Kean, a Langara criminology instructor and former cop, is skeptical of the benefit to having police tweeting on the job. “Social media is a great tool but it can also be a huge time waster too.” “People may be more willing to send information by a tweet rather than stop, call or wait until they see a police officer. “But youre still limited to 140 char- acters, and that in itself may be a prob- lem.” This is the third tweet-along by a Vancouver police officer this year and the first by a DTES beat cop. 66 Just nabbed a shoplifter witha stolen hat stuffed in his pants. Says he was going to sell it for food. Sad. CONST. STEVE ADDISON via Twitter ICBC rate hike burdens student drivers B.C. car facts HM There is one car for every 1.6 person in the province HM The average insur- ance rate in B.C. was $1,113 in 2009 the second highest rate in Canada HE 29 per cent of the 2.8 million vehicles on the road in B.C. are found in the Metro Vancouver area ME There are more cars on the road today (2.79 million) than there were people 30 years ago (2.75 million) Source: Fraser Institute As the public insurer announced a new rate hike on the heels of other increases, students say they expect to feel the pinch By SHAWN GILL $30 annual increase on car insurance that will go into effect Feb. 1. Though this only amounts to an av- erage increase of $2.50 per month, it comes on the heels of several rate in- creases that have student drivers feel- ing the pinch. “TI don’t understand why they keep increasing it. ’'m definitely going to be feeling the pinch,” said Dona-Rita Nas- sour, a human kinetics student. Jordan Bateman, the B.C. director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, said although $2.50 a month doesn’t seem like a lot it should be viewed in the broader context of recent rate in- J: has just announced an average creases on drivers. “Drivers are feeling very pinched,” said Bateman in a phone interview. Noting that the rate increase for insur- ance comes after “increases to the gas tax through the annual increases of the carbon tax and the recently announced TransLink hike that increased the gas tax by $0.02 per litre.” The announcement of the rate in- crease comes after the public insurer has handed over $576 million to the pro- vincial government over the last two years. “The B.C. government has been tak- ing money out of ICBC to balance their own books. The province has to lower its spending,” Bateman said. ICBC President Jon Schubert said that the hand over of $576 million comes solely from the optional insur- ance side of the business. “This [money] could not have been used to reduce the impact on basic in- surance rates,” said Schubert by email. According to ICBC, the increased rates are the result of a $90 million de- cline in investment income this year and a $3850 million increase in bodily injury payments. Schubert said that ICBC is trying to bring down payments for bodily inju- ries by helping customers get better quicker, and investing in road safety. “Our intersection safety camera pro- gram is a great example of this,” Schubert said. According to a Fraser Institute study, as of 2009, the average auto insurance premium in B.C. was $1,118, the second highest rate in Canada. Ontario has the highest average premiums at $1,281, and Quebec has lowest the lowest aver- age premiums at $642 per month. Twenty-nine per cent of the 2.8 mil- lion vehicles in B.C. are in Greater Van- couver. Yet just over 40 per cent of the 258,000 automobile accidents in B.C. in 2010 took place in Greater Vancouver. There are more cars on the road to- day (2.79 million) than there were peo- ple in B.C. in 30 years ago (2.75 million). Today, there is one car for every 1.6 person in the province.