Commendations Corner - April-May 2016

Birchmount: David Ballantyne, Jason Balthazar, Richard Barkey, Vandy Barnes, Simone Carrington: “When we were entering Warden Station the driver hit the brake suddenly. At first we thought something was wrong; then we realized that some guy was trying to run in front of the bus from the side. She apologized for braking so hard and asked if we were okay. Thanks for asking.” … Daniel Clavette, Neil Curtin, Peter Diagoupis, Charles Dowson, Joseph Facchini, Mary Haggart, Joseph Hawkins, Neil Hermes, John Humphries, Amgad Kirolous, Thomas Leithwood, Robert Maatman, Neil Moore, Michael Nicholson, Christos Nikoletopoulos, Farid Nurmohamed, Harsh Pandey, Nellon Pemberton, Kathy Peonidis, Tina Pilgrim, Jim Polikratis, Steve Reynolds, Lance Savage, Andrew Thompson, Andrew Wilkinson

Customer Service Centre: Carol Barclay, Stephanie Ragone

Danforth: Sean Campbell, Gina Esposito, Jeffrey Gomes, Hasan Intwala, Thomas James, Todd Lewis, Daniel Medina, Gregory Parlane

Eglinton: Abdi Aden, Christina Atkinson, Gergo Biro, Tammy Blanchard, Arden Braun, Shawn Bredin, Michael Clarke, Liann Craig, Tanya Gardiner, Edgardo Gonzalez, Anna Germanis, Sylvie Larouche, James MacDowall, Devon Nembhard, Alan Peralta, Tristan Rose, Gopalakrish, Gopalakrish Sekar: “He deals with difficult people with ease and everyone seems to leave his bus with a smile on their face. We will surely miss his presence on the route and hope that he is returned to our route in the near future.” … Steven Wrigley

Malvern: Shahzad Awan, Nick Cimone, Margaret Correia, Lisa Crawford, Zeno Felthman, Mathew Gauthier Peter Gyimothy, Kester Harris, Sean Ingram, Christopher Jones, Kiriakos, Karakonstantis, Jason Leblond, John McGreeghan, Craig McIvor, Randy Nabert: “We LOVE this gentleman. He is ALWAYS so nice; always has a smile and hello for every passenger, and a genuine one.” … John Oostdyk, Amit Rampertab, Nicolas Renda, Paul Rellinger, Danielle Ray, Bradley Sharp, Eugenio Teodoro, Tan Tran, Pandurankan Visuvanathan

Mount Dennis: Jinu Abraham, Ashraf Ali, Basil Ashman, Pasqualis Athanasiou, Milan Baric, Tracy Brown, Nelson Carreiro, Amin Damji, Valter Duarte, Irving Edwards, David Elrick, Robert Fallone, Angelo Flabiano, Jerome Graham, Leda Halle, Gino Ielo, Miroslaw Jacyniak, Stuart Johnston, Mandeep Kang: “The driver was patient, kind and helpful. He didn’t need to get involved, but by doing so he was able to remove some of the stress I was feeling that day. Overall, the bus drivers I’ve had on route 6 south have all been great drivers, pleasant and helpful.” … Jasmine Kakuk, Lenworth Lewis, Tahir Malik, Meghann McDonough, Begashaw Mekonnen, Earl Nembhard, Nicole Nugent, David O’Neill, Sergio Rizzo, Ravi Singh, Bruno Trim, Stuart Yalowsky

Pensions: Anna Puccia

Plant Maintenance: Mahamud Abdi, Georgina Anokye, Trevon Ishmael

Queensway: Thomas Alcantara, Michelangel Curto, Stephen Fontana, Craig Forbes, Patricia Gale, Beth Kielty, Steven Lachapelle, Nadia Lamanna, Robert Mancini: “The Operator is amazing, positive personality, excellent customer service skills; it’s obvious that the safety of his passengers is very important to him. Excellent job performance.” … Sukhjinder Singh, Michelle Spiteri, Errol Wilson

Roncesvalles: Roman Dzerowicz, Paul Kennedy, Janet Moniz, Alan Nieweglowski, Mitchell Soares

Russell: Jessie Antonio, Vito Bellino, Dominic Bogacki, Mitchener Chapman, Stephen Duncan, Theodore Grozdanis, Eshantha Guneratna, Kester Fitzpatrick, Terry Mannella, Dion Mokund, Everton Morris, Sutyan Ng, Marilyn Pearson, Curt Richards

Stations: Michael Sanderson, Roopnarine Singh

Transit Enforcement: Tennyson Ramsay

Wheel-Trans: Gil Allan Dicion, Anthony Annibale, Dragan Balog, Jason Baker, Denise Bowes, Adam Bryson, Joven Datoon, Kevin Dill, Damien Egan-Wyer: “I am very fond of this driver and hope to travel with him again.” … Casey Grenier, Anthony Gunpath, Husam Hajjar, Scott Harrop, Chris Heidinger, Mark Hollidge, Peggy Howard, Giulio Iacono, Wayne Jones, Chris Karakousis, Gin Kelly, Daniel Lawrence, Cecil London, Brian Lucas, William Mackinnon, Yuenwig Mak, Christina Martinez, Marcelo Martinez, Paul McLay, Andres Menendez, Karim Mohamed, Mike Perocchi, Trevor Persaud, Ken Pollard, Mike Powell, Melissa Richards, Nigel Richardson, Murray Robertson, Mitra Stergios, Dwight Thomas, Lyn Whitmore, Mark Woodhouse

Wilson-Bus: Geovany Hidalgo

Wilson-Subway: Chris Jones

Letter

Operator Maatman saves more than just a cellphone

I got up and scrambled around looking for my phone in a panic (to the dismay of other riders) and asked the bus driver (Birchmount Operator Robert Maatman) to stop and to let me out. He asked so kindly, “Anything I can do to help?”

I quickly said I think I lost my phone and asked him to stop the bus and got out and ran in the cold back to bus stop to find nothing on the ground – heartbroken! The phone I was okay with losing, despite being worth $900, but the memories of my 13-month-old son that were lost – he had just started daycare and me going back to work after a year, was a heavy feeling.

I ran home, called the phone and asked my husband to call the phone; all this with a crying child due to noise in the house as the little one gets ready for daycare. A call comes on my husband’s phone with a sweet voice, “I have your phone and happy to make sure it gets back to you.”

AHHH! The moment was akin to fireworks going off in my heart! He was nice enough to ask me if he should turn if off or leave it on, and said he would keep it safe for me.

Rob and I met at Broadview Station around 4:30 p.m. where he does the regular pick up. He was so sweet and I showed him the reason I was panicked and ran like a nut ball back to the bus stop and he said, “That is so beautiful.”

He told me that the phone had perfectly fallen between a crack and was resting on the ledge and he saw it when it was being lit up when we were calling. THANK GOODNESS FOR ROB!! Thank you, Rob, for gently moving me through the city despite my nutty moments!! Specially thanks for saving my precious family memories!

Jay and family,
Toronto