Vaughan residents irked by ‘sneaky’ subway tickets dubbed ‘money grab’

One managed to cancel violation, however, he is still pressing to improve VMC's parking situation

Yorkregion.com
November 21, 2019
Dina Al-Shibeeb

Two Vaughan residents are angered for being slapped with $50 parking tickets at the Vaughan Metropolitan Centre (VMC) subway without even being “confronted” by a bylaw officer.

“I'd be curious to know if the City had an education period to let people know about their sneaky photo ticket money grab,” said Deniel Pinero.

Pinero’s son dropped his sister at the VMC subway where he pulled in for a “split of a second ... the time would require a person to get out and close the door” in late August.

The family found out that they were ticketed after Pinero received “registered mail” that needed to be picked up at the post office.

Without them noticing, they were ticketed $50 for the offence, “a stop on highway prohibited time.”

“There’s no drop-off area that I can see. Very poor planning on the City’s behalf, and only going to get worse with time,” said the frustrated Pinero.

For Bert Wolf, he was ticketed $50 Sep. 23 and he also found out about the offence after receiving a notice in the mail.

After dropping his daughter, Wolf’s offence was, “Stop on highway within an intersection,” on Millway Avenue, where the VMC subway is located.

After appealing the ticket, his “violation was cancelled” based on what he presented to the City’s adjudicator, citing congestion of the area and “poor planning.”

In his appeal, Wolf described how “the area in question is heavy with pedestrian and vehicular traffic at any time of the day but especially at 7:48 a.m.”

“There are no appropriate so called “kiss & ride” areas,” he emphasized.

He also expressed frustration of how bylaw officers “concentrate on taking pictures of vehicles” at the “T” interaction of Millawy and the street connecting to the subway, New Park Place.

He also said that “bylaw officers do not enforce the no stopping at the time of day,” creating “traffic chaos.”

Near the station, “some passengers exit vehicles while stuck behind another vehicle or while yielding to pedestrians crossing in front of them. This may have been the case with my vehicle the day of the penalty. Making use of a momentary stop in traffic to exit a vehicle is probably now a crime too?”

Despite his success in cancelling this violation, he is still pressing to eliminate the “money grab” scheme, a term Pinero also used.

“I promised to further take it with local councillor as the situation around the subway is a joke, especially with the movable parking signs and cabs hogging the 10-minute parking areas.”

Wolf feels the ticketing policy doesn’t seem to be uniform especially after he took the task of observing the situation on his own.

“There are vehicles that stop in no-stopping zones and stop in live lines of traffic creating traffic chaos,” he said. “But I did not notice them being ticketed on two occasions I visited and viewed the officers doing their job.”

Wolf has also visited the York Region Police Department and learned that police won’t ticket people stopping in an interception whether turning left or right.

While commuter lots are available at subway stations at Highway 407 and Pioneer Village in Vaughan, which provide 550 and 1,880 parking spaces respectively, the city said, “The design for the VMC did not include a commuter lot for transit users.”

“As part of the transit facilities in the VMC, pickup and drop-off zones are available along New Park Place and Millway Avenue,” it added.

And when asked why was there not a clear sign to warn about this photo ticket, the city said, “Any tags issued anywhere in the City of Vaughan involves an officer being present at the infraction and witnessing the offence first-hand.”

“Enforcement Officers are permitted to simply note the violation, details, licence plate and serve the ticket by mail.”

From January to Sept. 11, “the face value of tickets issued in the VMC for no stopping, is approximately $135,000.”

“This does not reflect the amount collected by the City of Vaughan as there are options to dispute which may result in reduced fines.”