After 17 years of voicing announcements on TTC vehicles and in stations throughout Toronto, Danny Nicholson says he is calling it quits.
“It went by so fast — as fast as a subway train,” Nicholson said of his years warning riders to stay behind yellow lines or give up their seats to pregnant women or the elderly.
He says people at restaurants and other public places have asked him why his voice is so familiar to them.
“Do you take the subway?” is how he always responds. “It is weird when you hear your voice on the subway but it’s flattering when someone recognizes them.”
Before joining the TTC, Nicholson worked in broadcasting, and he once provided live transit updates on CP24
Since his start, he said the most significant changes at the TTC all have to do with its ballooning ridership.
“That was probably the biggest change in the TTC, in terms of getting funding from various levels on government in order to keep up with ridership,” he said, alluding to the TTC’s purchase of new subway trains and streetcars.
In 1999, the TTC carried 393 million passengers. In 2014, it carried nearly 535 million passengers.
He said the most memorable part of his career was warning media outlets and the public of the last TTC workers’ strike, which commenced at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday, April 26, 2008.
“People were stranded downtown so that weekend I was in the office until 3 a.m. and back at the office at 7 a.m., and I basically worked all weekend.”
The strike ended the next day when the provincial government passed back to work legislation.
He says his son teases him about his work whenever he can.
“Often if I’m travelling on the subway with my son Luke, every time my voice would come on, he would tell me to shut up. You get used to it after a while.”
After a trip to England next week, Nicholson says he plans to come home and start doing freelance voiceover work, which he was not allowed to do while employed by the TTC.
