The Toronto Star reports that the British Columbia government says a bus service will be available between Prince George and Prince Rupert by the end of the year on a notorious stretch of road known as the Highway of Tears.
Eighteen women have been murdered or have disappeared along Highway 16 and adjacent routes since the 1970s.
Transportation Minister Todd Stone says agreements between 16 communities along the highway will allow B.C. Transit to operate a scheduled bus service, slated to start at the end of the year. The provincial government announced a five-point transportation plan late last year that promised regular B.C. Transit service and programs to train bus drivers from area First Nation communities. Stone says the B.C. government is providing an extra $1 million to run the bus service while the federal government is contributing $1 million to fund bus shelters, lights and webcams along the route.
Mark Nielsen of The Citizen notes that Greyhound Canada "will be keeping an eye on how the provincial government's plan for public transit along Highway 16 West is rolled out and will be seeking to make adjustments accordingly, the company's senior vice president said Tuesday." One possibility would be to seek permission from the Passenger Transportation Board to abandon passenger service along the route entirely and focus exclusively on carrying freight, said Stuart Kendrick.
Right now Greyhound offers just one return trip between Prince George and Prince Rupert each day and ridership is low. "We're struggling on that corridor with average loads of about 11 people per trip and you need double or more to be viable," Kendrick said.
Kendrick is in agreement with the B.C. Government's proposal to offer subsidized bus service along the route, but would prefer that the subsidy were given to Greyhound, or taken through an RFP (Request for Proposal) as long as Greyhound was relieved of any obligation to provide service on the route.
Back in 2012 Greyhound announced plans to significantly reduce its scheduled bus service in B.C. along the Highway of Tears to stop the company's financial growing losses. At the time Greyhound claimed it was losing an unsustainable $14.1 million a year on its scheduled passenger operations in B.C..
Greyhound sought permission from the provincial government's Passenger Transportation Board to cut service along 15 routes around the province. Greyhound senior vice president Stuart Kendrick said at the time there was "no intention to abandon the route, just to have some flexibility to meet market demands."
In its' submission to the Passenger Transportation Board, Greyhound said the average passenger load then was just 10.48 and 11.07 and revenue per passenger mile was $2.31 and $2.25 on the two trips it wanted to eliminate between Prince George and Prince Rupert.
Break even was $5.69 per passenger mile, which usually required 35 passengers per trip, Kendrick said
Northern Health's bus service for patients who need transportation to medical appointments came under fire in Greyhound's submission to the transportation agency as the company claimed the provider takes no steps to ensure users are only passengers with a doctor's referral.
But a Northern Health spokesperson said that is not the case and Kendrick backed away from the assertion somewhat, saying Greyhound had different information when it looked into the service.
Improving public transportation along Highway 16 has been of concern to the Mayor of Smithers, B.C., Taylor Bachrach, and was one of the recommendations of the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry (MWCI), which was prepared by commissioner Wally Oppal in 2012.
When the Trans Canada Highway was completed in 1962, Greyhound was granted exclusive rights to the then lucrative Calgary to Vancouver routes. Although Voyageur Colonial successfully challenged the monopoly in Court in the 1980's, no other bus company has ever operated scheduled service on the Calgary-Vancouver route.
While Greyhound predicted in 2012 that there would be no takers should the route be opened up for competition, saying that if they sustain a considerable loss operating scheduled service on the route, no other operator would be willing to risk competing for it. However, Greyhound has said that while they regularly assess our routes and customer loads per trip of these routes to determine the demand in each location, the Company would not release passenger statistics for competitive reasons.
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