Dragging a bicycle down the stairs of a subway station often comes with an abundance of "tsks" and dirty looks from fellow passenges, and a wayward pivoting front wheel can catch on clothing or trip up the flow of human traffic. Plus, some riders can get royally peeved if something is impeding their way as they fly frantically down the stairs to beat the door chimes—waiting for the next train is, of course, unthinkable.......

"The Better Way Gets Better," yesterday's TTC press release proclaimed, teasing the media for today's big announcement of service changes. And, really, it'd be hard to disagree. As anticipated, today at the TTC's Arrow Road Garage, David Miller and Adam Giambrone announced a fleet of changes to the TTC's fleet of bus and streetcar routes, designed to decrease crowding and increase service across the system: 75 bus and the Queen, King, and Carlton streetcar......

The TTC was coasting for a long time on its "best transit system in the world!" laurels before Mike Harris cut it down to size. In fact, the commision was so happy with itself that it failed to notice that transit systems in other large cities were doing all sorts of neat-o things. For example: while we all love losing tiny TTC tokens (or even occasionally finding them in the laundry) other transit systems......

Even though tomorrow is World Car Free Day, Torontoist wants to warn those TTC virgins that sometimes the Better Way is not always the Better Smelling Way. Gawker just released a NYC Transit - Google map mash up of what each station smells like for their glorious Gotham. We suspect that if this kind of map were to be created for Toronto, the TTC would send out legal notices like it did poor local blogger......

The above headline is an anagram for the Better Way. Inspired by a recent anagram map of the London Underground blogger RobotJohny does a similar map of the TTC. The results are often poetic. The stations of the Scarborough RT in particular lent themselves to anagrams like "Arborescent Grouch" (Scarborough Centre), "Morrocan Wad" (McCowan Road). We also think that "A Warmer Soupy Butt" should be the TTC's new slogan. via Boing Boing......

Almost a year to the day, the TTC is announcing a second fare hike. Most pranksters use whoopee cushions, fake phone calls and deception to play April Fools' Jokes. Howard Moscoe and the TTC just use fare hikes. As of Apr. 1 getting on the Better Way is going to cost you $2.75, which means a round trip goes over the $5 barrier. Torontoist suggests that penny pinchers start hoarding tickets and tokens now. More......

Special thanks to the folks at the Toronto Public Space Committee, and their eight-month fight against video ads in our subway cars. Yesterday, TTC commissioners voted 4-3 against allowing Viacom Outdoor to proceed with what would have been a new level of intrusiveness to our journeys around the city. Artists! The Toronto Public Space Committee currently has a call for submissions for The Better Way: Redesigning the TTC: Replacing Ads With Your Imagination art show......