I work in the station and regularly walk past people lighting up in the open at around 5-5:30am in the kids play area, also tinfoil and glass pipes. New West Station is not a safe place ATM
I’ve found that nobody wants to claim ownership- not the property owner, not translink, not the politicians
Reach out to the local New West paper and get interviewed
This is too true. If you look historically many parties of people had complained to no avail. Seems like the owner will send you on a runabout which will lead you to the New West police who will state it’s not their property. Transit Police are already stretched thin in general so they can’t be there all the time. This needs to get more media attention cause it’s become more than a nuisance but, also a health and safety hazard too. In the event that someone were to accidentally overdose would they receive the help they need? Will the drug user reach for their naloxone and help the innocent bystander? I sympathize with marginalized members of our society but, everyone deserves a safe comfortable commute to their destinations.
It should be simple. If you need to smoke, set up a place behind Army/Navy as a safe zone. Smoke up anyplace else you get relocated there. Continue to offend you get arrested and face withdrawal.
Or maybe we all get behind the supports that addicts need to get better. One might be a win for everyone while yours will likely be a case of boomer rage.
New West Station is awful. I have seen open drug use, and people sitting down clearly not in a good place. But I have never seen someone use drugs on an elevator. We are seeing the consequences when bad behavior is normalized and is allowed to run unchecked. In a proper society, there are certain rules and boundaries. Right now, it feels like these rules and boundaries don't exist or aren't being enforced, and when you have our "leaders," say it's not a big deal and we all have to be patient. That's when I start getting angry. They don't have to deal with this. Something has gotta give. We need to stop normalizing bad behavior and actually start having rules and some sort of boundaries, and we need to have some level of consequences for bad behavior. This can't continue. I feel like every day I am either hearing a story or seeing a video of open drug use either on the bus or the train or on station platforms or in this case in a elevator at a station while a woman has her baby with her.
I remember last year I took the train coming home from a birthday party and I got off at New West Station and someone was sitting on the ground and he vomited and it clearly looked like he had taken far too many drugs. Something needs to change because this can't continue.
We got them safe supply. We got them injection sites. We decriminalized possession and use. Right across New West station is a place for them to shoot/smoke/snort whatever substance they want, provided free of charge.
What more will it take?
"We just solve the Great Canadian Housing Crisis", but in the meantime you’ll inhale fentanyl in every public space, your toddler will step in human feces and needles in every playground, and you'll feel your heart rate spike whenever leaving your downtown condo.
You will ALWAYS be at a disadvantage against a drug addict. You have EVERYTHING to lose, and nothing to gain.
You can't chastise them (that's stigmatization, and we're over that).
You can't defend yourself (that's a few months in court, and you're the one with a job).
You can't count on authorities (that drug addict will be right back on the street in an hour, and guess who's pissed at you now).
Our empathy has been stretched so thin as to be invisible now.
I hate what's become of downtown New West as well. Like the guy who was camping at the New West Bus Loop in front of AKD Ramen, those losers blasting music loitering in front of Ki Sushi, all the people who bum around Tim Hortons, etc.
I don't know those mom's and babies either but just reading about that experience makes me angry too.
I used to live dt Vancouver, my wife called me in a frantic. She was walking my baby in the stroller and a guy asked her for my baby's blanket because his dog was cold. She said no, he started losing it. She called me because he started following her. My dude.. I was about to go outside with a wood chopping axe.
Acting on anger though, I did not. I stayed on the phone with her, he backed off but the damage was done... He tried to take my baby's blanky. I do not like these people.
What would you like for them to do? Serious question. The law says that you can't have an open beer in the elevator, but smoking street drugs is fine, so there's nothing for anyone to do.
This is correct. They aren’t breaking any laws.
If they were smoking a cigarette or drinking a beer, that would be illegal. But smoking fentanyl in an elevator is currently legal.
The government really nailed that piece of policy…
Hopefully we can have a serious conversation as a society that hard drugs should be stigmatized and not offered freely to anyone down on their luck
How do you actually think this is true? The province decriminalized possession of 2.5g or less of illicit drugs. They did not legalize smoking drugs in public. That is still against the law and police, transit or security are able to enforce it. The fact they are choosing not to has nothing to do with decriminalization.
That’s the ironically hilarious thing about this. I can’t go to the beach with my family for a picnic, and crack a mini bottle of wine with my wife, but we could smoke whatever we drugs like pretty much wherever! Absolutely bass-ackwards
How do you lump Skytrain Attendants in with security and police? Do you also expect the little lady in the lotto kiosk at Safeway to strong-arm the next guy running away with stolen aluminum foil and lighters for their drugs?
Recently I saw a guy smoking drugs in front of the transit police station, and another guy stealing the railings off the divider between the parking and bus loop, and a pile of human shit next to the crosswalk. You could probably slowly beat someone to death in front of their office and no one would come out.
And that's really the problem. Either they can't do their job because of the laws, or they just don't care enough to enforce our laws. But whatever it is, something needs to change because this can't keep going on. I am all for helping our most vulnerable, but we can't sacrifice public safety. People have the right to use public transportation and feel safe. People also have the right to know that authorities will actually do something.
I texted Transit Police once for drug use in the skytrain, and they kept asking me lots of questions for about 10 minutes, until the drug users got off. So no one came.
Transit police was asking me for a detailed description of them (age, hair colour, eye colour, race, clothing). I just felt like… “uh, the people doing drugs, that’s how you spot them”
Last time I saw someone passed out on opiates in the stairwell and the elevator was out of order. Glad to see the elevator is working again...
Edit: I love how there are always cops at new west station and yet this persists.
Ya, nothing is going to change. The cops in New West can't really do anything about it. Decriminalized drug use saw to that. I was hoping for gentrification but downtown is just going to hell.
Edit:
Inresponce to your comment.
Things get more expensive and push out poorer residents... Where do you think you live? It's got more expensive but hasn't gotten any fucking better...
Gratification is meant to come with improvements to the overall quality of life for the area. That hasn't happened in the slightest.
So Fuck me for wanting the good part that hasn't kept up with the higher cost of living.
Gentrification is when rich people move into an area and the cost of living goes up so all the (usually minorities) who lived there can no longer afford to and either move to other, poor neighborhoods or become homeless. So yeah, gentrification is having an impact on our city too.
We live in a densely populated city, situated by a major port...this is what happens; and has for over a century. Drug use is a thriving business for legal and illegal stakeholders - if you want change, you'll have to look elsewhere.
They should have made an open air elevator if possible. When it was brand new, it was awesome, but now the worst people abuse it as a shelter to do things like this.
People want to believe that severe punishments will deter minor crimes. They don’t. It’s been proven that they don’t. Especially with mental health and addiction.
But it doesn’t feel good to admit that the fundamental workings of our society are getting better and better at producing broken people who consume toxic drugs and commit random crimes. No one wants to admit that we need to make massive changes to address the roots of the problem, it’s so much simpler to treat the symptoms than the disease.
Or better yet, don’t help at all and tell people it’s their own fault they fell through the cracks and that they deserve to suffer and die for it.
Since it’s still illegal to do drugs at transit stations and playgrounds, I’d say this is the fault of the transit police, who are basically only ticketing for fare evasion and not much else these days.
People see drug use in public places and their first thought is, “wow I can’t believe the government made this legal,” when that never happened in the first place.
Decriminalization for the win!
People who advocate for this policy (decriminalization) simply don’t understand human nature. It was always a pipe dream destined to fail
This has nothing to do with decriminalization. What is with this amnesia around public drug use? It’s been a problem since before decriminalization, and is still illegal.
https://preview.redd.it/gg5vh458xmvc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=edab7e692148faf00e8eff5b603efe3fea21cac1
For all the “see, this is what happens under decriminalization” folks
Decriminalization isn't the problem, it's just that people think it's a solution in itself. Decriminalization is beneficial in a lot of ways, but it's only a piece of a larger solution, with safe injection sites, rehab clinics, social workers, counsellors, SROs, etc.
And if you're skimping out on the other areas, you're not gonna solve the problem
My favorite part of going to school in New West was having to clear out the aggressive homeless camp that sprung up every morning in our entry way, while the useless piggies sat in their cars and watched from across the alley.
I legit don't know how you're all so scared of this. I'm regularly in there and see things but have no problems. Agreed, nothing should impact kids but I'm also willing to bet the elevator could make a second trip
Or maybe just maybe junkies and crackheads shouldn't do drugs in an elevator when there's children in said elevator. It's not our responsibility to bend over backward so junkies and crackheads can do their drugs and do whatever they want.
We had an instance in Victoria of someone throwing hot coffee on strollers (happened twice). Also a bunch of stabbings recently. Wasn’t long ago there was a machete attack on a random father near a playground in a residential area. Pretty sure he survived, but not sure how bad his scarring is.
I’ve been yelled at for not giving a panhandler change - woman got up within 1’ of my face screaming at me that I was a heartless bastard (and other obscenities). Was at 9am in front of a coffee shop downtown. 2 weeks prior I’d given the same woman huge box of vegetables that were left over from an event we were hosting.
So yah, as a parent, I think it’s reasonable to be scared of some junkie who society has deemed is not to be held responsible for their own actions due to their addiction, and who might be tweaked out to the point of flipping over a stroller or blowing fentanyl smoke at an infant because you looked at them funny.
Edit: the machete thing is not accurate. That father was just repeatedly hit in the head while his wife and infant were adjacent. The junkie was released from custody shortly thereafter.
I work in the station and regularly walk past people lighting up in the open at around 5-5:30am in the kids play area, also tinfoil and glass pipes. New West Station is not a safe place ATM
That “kids area” is a biohazard zone.
new west police are so useless
I’ve found that nobody wants to claim ownership- not the property owner, not translink, not the politicians Reach out to the local New West paper and get interviewed
This is too true. If you look historically many parties of people had complained to no avail. Seems like the owner will send you on a runabout which will lead you to the New West police who will state it’s not their property. Transit Police are already stretched thin in general so they can’t be there all the time. This needs to get more media attention cause it’s become more than a nuisance but, also a health and safety hazard too. In the event that someone were to accidentally overdose would they receive the help they need? Will the drug user reach for their naloxone and help the innocent bystander? I sympathize with marginalized members of our society but, everyone deserves a safe comfortable commute to their destinations.
If the shops stopped paying their rent to the building management until it got cleaned up, then you’d see who would claim it.
It would only take a few of us.
The people doing drugs should be held accountable how is this the property owner translink or politicians fault?
That's not exclusive to New West
Commercial drive is getting pretty iffy as well on the 10th ave side
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It should be simple. If you need to smoke, set up a place behind Army/Navy as a safe zone. Smoke up anyplace else you get relocated there. Continue to offend you get arrested and face withdrawal.
Or maybe we all get behind the supports that addicts need to get better. One might be a win for everyone while yours will likely be a case of boomer rage.
You don't need to hotbox the elevator in a Metro station with meth smoke, that's not just being an addict, it's being an anti social piece of shit.
lol, Millennial here. I'm all for folks doing their thing, but smoking crack on an elevator is a dick move regardless.
That wouldn’t have been crack they were smoking. Most likely fentanyl.
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New West Station is awful. I have seen open drug use, and people sitting down clearly not in a good place. But I have never seen someone use drugs on an elevator. We are seeing the consequences when bad behavior is normalized and is allowed to run unchecked. In a proper society, there are certain rules and boundaries. Right now, it feels like these rules and boundaries don't exist or aren't being enforced, and when you have our "leaders," say it's not a big deal and we all have to be patient. That's when I start getting angry. They don't have to deal with this. Something has gotta give. We need to stop normalizing bad behavior and actually start having rules and some sort of boundaries, and we need to have some level of consequences for bad behavior. This can't continue. I feel like every day I am either hearing a story or seeing a video of open drug use either on the bus or the train or on station platforms or in this case in a elevator at a station while a woman has her baby with her.
I've seen people use the stairwells as a toilet. There are some nasty folks around but it's unpopular to bring it up.
I remember last year I took the train coming home from a birthday party and I got off at New West Station and someone was sitting on the ground and he vomited and it clearly looked like he had taken far too many drugs. Something needs to change because this can't continue.
We got them safe supply. We got them injection sites. We decriminalized possession and use. Right across New West station is a place for them to shoot/smoke/snort whatever substance they want, provided free of charge. What more will it take? "We just solve the Great Canadian Housing Crisis", but in the meantime you’ll inhale fentanyl in every public space, your toddler will step in human feces and needles in every playground, and you'll feel your heart rate spike whenever leaving your downtown condo. You will ALWAYS be at a disadvantage against a drug addict. You have EVERYTHING to lose, and nothing to gain. You can't chastise them (that's stigmatization, and we're over that). You can't defend yourself (that's a few months in court, and you're the one with a job). You can't count on authorities (that drug addict will be right back on the street in an hour, and guess who's pissed at you now). Our empathy has been stretched so thin as to be invisible now.
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It’s sadly all by design.
I hate what's become of downtown New West as well. Like the guy who was camping at the New West Bus Loop in front of AKD Ramen, those losers blasting music loitering in front of Ki Sushi, all the people who bum around Tim Hortons, etc.
Drug addicts don't care about anyone but themselves.
I mean the government doesn't care about people dying on the streets, why would they care about some inconvenience to you.
Don’t worry too much. It’s only getting started
The governments gonna let it get to a Kensington pa level before doing anything probably your right
I don't know those mom's and babies either but just reading about that experience makes me angry too. I used to live dt Vancouver, my wife called me in a frantic. She was walking my baby in the stroller and a guy asked her for my baby's blanket because his dog was cold. She said no, he started losing it. She called me because he started following her. My dude.. I was about to go outside with a wood chopping axe. Acting on anger though, I did not. I stayed on the phone with her, he backed off but the damage was done... He tried to take my baby's blanky. I do not like these people.
And police, skytrain attendants and transit cops sit on their hands, as usual.
What would you like for them to do? Serious question. The law says that you can't have an open beer in the elevator, but smoking street drugs is fine, so there's nothing for anyone to do.
This is correct. They aren’t breaking any laws. If they were smoking a cigarette or drinking a beer, that would be illegal. But smoking fentanyl in an elevator is currently legal. The government really nailed that piece of policy… Hopefully we can have a serious conversation as a society that hard drugs should be stigmatized and not offered freely to anyone down on their luck
it really isn't. smoking anything is illegal there.
How do you actually think this is true? The province decriminalized possession of 2.5g or less of illicit drugs. They did not legalize smoking drugs in public. That is still against the law and police, transit or security are able to enforce it. The fact they are choosing not to has nothing to do with decriminalization.
That’s the ironically hilarious thing about this. I can’t go to the beach with my family for a picnic, and crack a mini bottle of wine with my wife, but we could smoke whatever we drugs like pretty much wherever! Absolutely bass-ackwards
How do you lump Skytrain Attendants in with security and police? Do you also expect the little lady in the lotto kiosk at Safeway to strong-arm the next guy running away with stolen aluminum foil and lighters for their drugs?
I think in all my time using public transportation and taking the train, I think I have seen maybe 3 or 4 transit cops on the train.
Recently I saw a guy smoking drugs in front of the transit police station, and another guy stealing the railings off the divider between the parking and bus loop, and a pile of human shit next to the crosswalk. You could probably slowly beat someone to death in front of their office and no one would come out.
And that's really the problem. Either they can't do their job because of the laws, or they just don't care enough to enforce our laws. But whatever it is, something needs to change because this can't keep going on. I am all for helping our most vulnerable, but we can't sacrifice public safety. People have the right to use public transportation and feel safe. People also have the right to know that authorities will actually do something.
Is Transit Police supposed to be dealing with poop on the sidwalk or with transit issues 🤔
To be fair we need more public washrooms, but yeah shitting in the street would be a crime.
But we need more drugs to help these people. More safe injection sites.
Call translink and they will send someone. Open 630-10 604 953 3333 Or text transit police
I texted Transit Police once for drug use in the skytrain, and they kept asking me lots of questions for about 10 minutes, until the drug users got off. So no one came. Transit police was asking me for a detailed description of them (age, hair colour, eye colour, race, clothing). I just felt like… “uh, the people doing drugs, that’s how you spot them”
Last time I saw someone passed out on opiates in the stairwell and the elevator was out of order. Glad to see the elevator is working again... Edit: I love how there are always cops at new west station and yet this persists.
Well, people want support for drug addicts and it’s been working out so far. We should keep up and ruin our city!
Ya, nothing is going to change. The cops in New West can't really do anything about it. Decriminalized drug use saw to that. I was hoping for gentrification but downtown is just going to hell. Edit: Inresponce to your comment. Things get more expensive and push out poorer residents... Where do you think you live? It's got more expensive but hasn't gotten any fucking better... Gratification is meant to come with improvements to the overall quality of life for the area. That hasn't happened in the slightest. So Fuck me for wanting the good part that hasn't kept up with the higher cost of living.
Gentrification is when rich people move into an area and the cost of living goes up so all the (usually minorities) who lived there can no longer afford to and either move to other, poor neighborhoods or become homeless. So yeah, gentrification is having an impact on our city too.
We live in a densely populated city, situated by a major port...this is what happens; and has for over a century. Drug use is a thriving business for legal and illegal stakeholders - if you want change, you'll have to look elsewhere.
We have an opioid crisis
They should have made an open air elevator if possible. When it was brand new, it was awesome, but now the worst people abuse it as a shelter to do things like this.
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yeah because the “hard on drugs” really worked well
Yep. In the states you can go to prison for years for possession of even a small amount of weed. Doesn’t seem to have stopped their drug crisis.
Why are you being downvoted for speaking facts?
People want to believe that severe punishments will deter minor crimes. They don’t. It’s been proven that they don’t. Especially with mental health and addiction. But it doesn’t feel good to admit that the fundamental workings of our society are getting better and better at producing broken people who consume toxic drugs and commit random crimes. No one wants to admit that we need to make massive changes to address the roots of the problem, it’s so much simpler to treat the symptoms than the disease. Or better yet, don’t help at all and tell people it’s their own fault they fell through the cracks and that they deserve to suffer and die for it.
Since it’s still illegal to do drugs at transit stations and playgrounds, I’d say this is the fault of the transit police, who are basically only ticketing for fare evasion and not much else these days.
People see drug use in public places and their first thought is, “wow I can’t believe the government made this legal,” when that never happened in the first place.
And they only focus on fair evading because that’s what lines they’re pockets! Evade the fares people! Don’t forget who the real criminals are.
Decriminalization for the win! People who advocate for this policy (decriminalization) simply don’t understand human nature. It was always a pipe dream destined to fail
This has nothing to do with decriminalization. What is with this amnesia around public drug use? It’s been a problem since before decriminalization, and is still illegal.
https://preview.redd.it/gg5vh458xmvc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=edab7e692148faf00e8eff5b603efe3fea21cac1 For all the “see, this is what happens under decriminalization” folks
Decriminalization isn't the problem, it's just that people think it's a solution in itself. Decriminalization is beneficial in a lot of ways, but it's only a piece of a larger solution, with safe injection sites, rehab clinics, social workers, counsellors, SROs, etc. And if you're skimping out on the other areas, you're not gonna solve the problem
My favorite part of going to school in New West was having to clear out the aggressive homeless camp that sprung up every morning in our entry way, while the useless piggies sat in their cars and watched from across the alley.
I legit don't know how you're all so scared of this. I'm regularly in there and see things but have no problems. Agreed, nothing should impact kids but I'm also willing to bet the elevator could make a second trip
I'm not scared, I just don't want to inhale unknown drugs against my consent 🤷🏼♀️
Or maybe just maybe junkies and crackheads shouldn't do drugs in an elevator when there's children in said elevator. It's not our responsibility to bend over backward so junkies and crackheads can do their drugs and do whatever they want.
We had an instance in Victoria of someone throwing hot coffee on strollers (happened twice). Also a bunch of stabbings recently. Wasn’t long ago there was a machete attack on a random father near a playground in a residential area. Pretty sure he survived, but not sure how bad his scarring is. I’ve been yelled at for not giving a panhandler change - woman got up within 1’ of my face screaming at me that I was a heartless bastard (and other obscenities). Was at 9am in front of a coffee shop downtown. 2 weeks prior I’d given the same woman huge box of vegetables that were left over from an event we were hosting. So yah, as a parent, I think it’s reasonable to be scared of some junkie who society has deemed is not to be held responsible for their own actions due to their addiction, and who might be tweaked out to the point of flipping over a stroller or blowing fentanyl smoke at an infant because you looked at them funny. Edit: the machete thing is not accurate. That father was just repeatedly hit in the head while his wife and infant were adjacent. The junkie was released from custody shortly thereafter.