November 29 Nobody Pays fare evasion

In response to the worldwide “Nobody Pays” call to action on November 29 for fare evasions, a small but spirited crew did just that after the climate march in downtown so-called Toronto. We joined the march as a Free Transit Now bloc, and passed out leaflets with some ideas about why transit is a climate, race, and class issue, why it should be free, and why fare enforcement is bad and fare evasion is cool, especially in the context of international solidarity. At the end of the march, we circulated through the crowd chanting “Public transit should be free! Liberate the TTC!” and “Fuck the cops, fuck the haters, power to the fare evaders!”, then headed over to a nearby subway station. Our chants grew more powerful and joyous as we entered the station, jumping over barriers and sneaking through openings, holding the gates open for each other and encouraging others in the station to join us, some of whom did! As the subway rolled out of the station a cheer went up and we passed out more leaflets to other riders.

While it would have been even more exciting to have had a truly “mass” evasion, it was an exciting and empowering moment, and one we hope will encourage future organizing towards much larger actions.