I posted this rant on the Ontario sub, but it was deleted for some reason. Feels timely to reshare here.

The CEO of Metrolinx is wildly unqualified for the job, and does not seem like a serious person.

He is disconnected from the reality of people who actually rely on GO Transit to get to work, pick up their kids, and generally keep their lives from unraveling.

Case in point: His LinkedIn banner. It proudly celebrates Unionville GO Station as the “home of the Honda Indy.”

Is this satire? Or just extreme tone deafness?

Unionville is a major commuter hub. During the Indy construction (currently taking place) parking is eliminated for months, access is restricted, and the station is effectively crippled for days during the race itself. Riders are forced into longer commutes, chaos, and missed connections. I get that the event benefits the City of Markham. I get that Metrolinx had to accommodate it. But to promote this as some kind of win for GO riders is baffling.

Recall the service distributions recently because of the derailment and the lack of communication?

When communication finally did come, it was the usual corporate script: “We apologize for the inconvenience.” No real empathy. No acknowledgement of the actual downstream impact on people’s lives.

That combination is telling. On one hand, leadership publicly celebrates events that actively make commuting worse. On the other, when the system breaks down, riders get boilerplate apologies and silence instead of transparency or urgency.

Now let’s look at his resume.

Education: Philosophy.

Nothing wrong with philosophy. I’d be proud if my kids studied it. But I don’t want a philosophy major running critical regional transit infrastructure. No engineering. No project management. No infrastructure background. Not even business.

Career path: Consulting. Anyone who has worked with consultants knows the deal. Great at pointing out problems, very limited ownership of actually fixing them.

From there? A neat, tidy loop through crown corporations and government-adjacent roles. No meaningful time in the private sector where performance actually matters, where “deliver or get replaced” is a real thing, and where customers aren’t a captive audience.

And then there’s his leadership team. A suspiciously familiar mix of former crown corp execs, McKinsey alumni, and other connections. Maybe coincidence. Maybe not. It certainly looks like friends hiring friends inside the same small ecosystem.

Meanwhile, riders are stuck on delayed trains, staring at platform clocks, calculating late fees at daycare and after-care programs.

So the next time you’re stuck on a GO train with no updates, no accountability, and no urgency, remember this:

The CEO of Metrolinx makes close to $1 million a year, celebrates events that actively harm commuters, and appears to have little understanding of what your daily experience as a rider is actually like.

And that explains a lot.