Stabbing heightens bus safety fears

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This article was published 14/08/2024 (443 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A passenger was stabbed aboard a packed Winnipeg Transit bus Tuesday afternoon, the latest violent incident driving some operators to resign.

Winnipeg Police Service officers were sent to a bus stop near Main Street and Selkirk Avenue at about 5 p.m. after a man in his 30s was stabbed on a bus. A man and woman suspected in the assault fled and remain at large.

“We want to encourage people to come on the bus, and in order to do that, we need to first and foremost make sure it’s safe,” said Chris Scott, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1505.

The man was transported to hospital in unstable condition and later upgraded to stable. Passengers and nearby witnesses were able to provide information to investigators, Winnipeg Police Service spokeswoman Const. Dani McKinnon said Wednesday.

Scott said violent incidents are prompting increased driver resignations and could threaten the city’s transit overhaul slated for next year.

The City of Winnipeg plans to change almost every transit route in the city and increase the number and frequency of stops. All told, there will be 142 changes to bus routes in the city, but Scott says there may not be enough drivers to fulfill the city’s plans.

“Many (drivers) are saying, ‘I would have liked to stay in a couple more years, but I just can’t do it anymore,’” Scott said, referring to complaints from drivers.

“Without operators, the successful launch of the transit master plan next year may be in jeopardy.”

A passenger who was waiting Wednesday at the bus stop near where the incident occurred said he hears of violent incidents regularly.

“I don’t always feel unsafe when I ride, but I do hear about (stabbings) often,” said the passenger, who declined to provide his name.

“I don’t always feel unsafe when I ride, but I do hear about (stabbings) often.”–Anonymous passenger

This year, 33 Transit drivers have resigned from their posts, according to numbers provided by the union. In November 2023, Transit had about 890 active drivers which falls 109 short of a full complement to provide the current service level. It would need 160-170 more to provide a full, pre-pandemic service level, according to a report submitted to the city.

Staffing levels for 2024 were not available.

Violence on buses remains an issue, too. As of Tuesday, union-compiled data shows 134 reported security incidents on buses this year, compared to 257 in 2023 and 130 in 2022. Incidents range from attempted assault, verbal assaults with weapons, shield punches, steering wheel grabs, assaults involving spit, drinks, pepper spray and indecent acts.

City data say as of July 30 there have been 44 reported assaults against Transit operators. There were 91 assaults against drivers in 2023 and 104 in 2022.

The union leader says the city “absolutely” needs more transit safety officers in its ranks, but doesn’t want to inundate public transportation with them or create a police state.

“I want to cap the level of violence,” he said. “The staffing needs to go hand in hand with the need for levels of government to fund resources for the underlying issues … food insecurity, housing insecurity, mental health supports, addictions treatments, stuff that is usually the underlying issue which forces people to act in this manner.”

The city employs 21 transit safety officers, but Scott says it’s not nearly enough to cover the more than 500 buses that drive the streets during peak traffic hours.

A safety officer wasn’t on the bus at the time of the Tuesday stabbing, Scott said.

“The city committed to two and a half million dollars a year on this program, and we’re asking the federal and provincial governments to, at the very least, match it so they can increase their ranks and provide more assurances to both the employees that work out there and the riding public that things are going to improve,” he said.

Justice Minister Matt Wiebe said the province is looking to work with the city further on the issue of transit safety.

“Any of these violent attacks really just erode the public’s confidence, in this case using transit, and that’s not acceptable,” Wiebe said at an unrelated news conference.

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Scott wants the city to take a more active approach and advocate for increased measures without worrying about the bottom line, including securing bus drivers with full enclosures, instead of the shield currently in place.

“You have to invest in order to get a good return, and we need to invest in safety measures in order to get employees on board that are willing to stay on the job,” he said.

Investigators are working with Winnipeg Transit to obtain video from the bus, which police will use to get descriptions of the suspects.

“Once that surveillance video is viewed, that’s going to provide quite a bit more information,” McKinnon said.

Police are asking anyone with information about the bus stabbing to call the major crimes unit at 204-986-6219 or Crime Stoppers at 204-786-8477 (TIPS).

nicole.buffie@freepress.mb.ca

Nicole Buffie
Multimedia producer

Nicole Buffie is a reporter for the Free Press city desk. Born and bred in Winnipeg, Nicole graduated from Red River College’s Creative Communications program in 2020 and worked as a reporter throughout Manitoba before joining the Free Press newsroom as a multimedia producer in 2023. Read more about Nicole.

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