Cities across Canada need greater security on transit and improved access to mental health and addiction services in order to help Canadians feel safe, one public safety analyst says.
“In the short term, it requires … more security, more police working together to make people safe and make people feel safe,” Chris Lewis, former commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police, said.
“And then society as a whole has to deal with these issues right across the country and more investment in mental health issues, addiction and homelessness, et cetera, to prevent this sort of thing from bubbling even further than it has.”
Many transit users report feeling less safe on public transit compared to a year ago, with certain violent and sometimes random attacks making headlines in recent months.
A survey in January, by Nanos Research, found as many as six in 10 public transit users said they felt less or somewhat less safe while commuting.
Police in recent days have charged a 22-year-old man with first-degree murder in the stabbing death of a 16-year-old teenager at a Toronto subway station.
Besides Toronto, cities such as Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver and Winnipeg are also reporting violent incidents on public transit.