Surrey North Delta Leader, October 17, 2013

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Seahawks swarmed by Hornets

Mystery hounds Surrey stage

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Thursday October 17, 2013

Serving Surrey and North Delta www.surreyleader.com

Transit cards can’t stop cheaters But TransLink expects Compass card fare evasion to be rare by Jeff Nagel TRANSLINK’S NEW Compass cards are vulnerable to a new form of cheating,

LEADER FILE PHOTO

Fare evaders who board a bus using the new Compass card could tap out without disembarking and pay for just one zone while continuing to ride further for free.

but officials think it will be rare and say the transit system will still be policed to root out those who board without paying the right fare. The new payment system rolling out over the next several months charges a default three zones when a passenger taps in to board and reduces the fare charged to one or two zones if they tap out after travelling the lesser distance. Fare evaders who board a bus could tap out using the reader at the exit door without disembarking and pay just one zone while continuing to ride further for free. But TransLink vice-president Mike Madill said the loophole to underpay on buses isn’t one cheaters can exploit anywhere. Eighty per cent of the 250 bus routes run within the same zone anyway, so it will only be an issue on the other 50 routes that cross zone boundaries. And he said only buses between Coquitlam and Vancouver pass through three zones – the rest just span two zones. Mike Madill It could be a bigger problem in the future, he said, if TransLink eliminates the current zones and shifts to a system that charges fares based on kilometres travelled. Madill said SkyTrain passengers who try the same thing – tapping in to get past fare gates and then immediately tapping out without exiting to pay for just one zone before riding for two or three – won’t be able to get out through the gates later without tapping out again. And the system will detect the second tap out and charge the user two or three zones accordingly. See SYSTEM / Page 3

Surrey SkyTrain ‘hero’ comes to injured man’s aid by Kevin Diakiw HEADING TO the Vancouver Canucks game against the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday, Brian Fleetwood was excited as he travelled with his brotherin-law to the Scott Road SkyTrain station. When the pair got there, it was about

5:30 p.m. Fleetwood noticed there was a person in medical distress on the train tracks. The man was bleeding heavily after hitting his head Fleetwood, 38, jumped in after him, only considering mid-jump that it might not be the best idea to leap onto a SkyTrain track. His first thought was that he might

Brian Fleetwood with his stepson Derek and nieces Cameron and MacKenzie.

get electrocuted. “I actually didn’t think about it until I was in mid-air between the platform and the track, and then I thought to myself, ‘I sure hope this doesn’t hurt’,” Fleetwood said in an interview from his home on Gabriola Island.

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See SISTER / Page 4

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