Route cuts upset bus travellers

Regular Greyhound bus passengers in Brandon are frustrated by the news that the company is making cuts to bus service in Manitoba.

As of July 1, 12 routes will be eliminated, and three others will have reduced service.

“It’s a shame,” said Irene Wallace of Brandon, as she waited for the bus on Thursday.

Wallace often takes the 3 p.m. bus from Brandon to Winnipeg to visit her family, and was disappointed to hear that it is one of the schedules to be discontinued this summer.

“I don’t intend to be driving for many more years,” Wallace said. “So I’ll just stay home then.”

Madeline Lowe, a Brandon University student from Winnipeg, often travels via Greyhound back and forth — usually taking the 3 p.m. bus.

“It probably means I’ll be using Greyhound less if I can’t get this route, because the other ones are pretty inconvenient for me,” Lowe said. “I’m getting picked up at the other end by my parents who work full time, so I have to work around their schedule as well. If I can’t make it work, I’ll have to find alternate ways.”

Passenger service will end on 12 routes including Highway 2 between Winnipeg and Brandon, Highway 3 between Winnipeg and Brandon, and a route that serves Minnedosa, Erickson and Russell.

Other routes will continue with reduced service, including the major Winnipeg-Brandon run along Highway 1.

David Stead, who operates a Greyhound depot at his farm supply business in Boissevain, said while the bus company does lots of freight business in the area, few people ride the bus these days. Boissevain is on a Highway 3 route that will lose passenger service July 1.

“There’s very little passenger use. It’s such a waste to use a big bus,” he said Wednesday. However, “the sad thing is that the people who use it really need it,” he added.

Greyhound Canada said the changes are being made to “better meet market demands.”

“This change in service is taking place following the provincial government’s announcement of increased flexibility in intercity bus service regulation in the area,” said a Greyhound statement.

“Really the change will provide Greyhound Canada with more flexibility and allow us to react to changes or needs in the rural communities much better,” said Greyhound Canada spokesman Timothy Stokes. The changes will not impact freight and parcel service.

The announcement was the latest step in an ongoing shift away from what was essentially a regulated monopoly. Greyhound has for years served the entire province, using profitable routes to subsidize smaller ones. But in 2009, the company threatened to pull out of Manitoba entirely, saying the financial losses were piling up.

The government stepped in with $3 million in subsidies for each of the past two years to keep the Greyhound system running, while also planning to open up the market to competition by this year.

The province is hoping other companies will step in to fill the void.

The province is partially deregulating intercity bus transport as of July 1, allowing companies to eliminate or modify service on routes as long as they provide 90 days notice.

Transportation Minister Steve Ashton said although many communities will lose Greyhound service, he expects smaller companies and individual communities will step in to fill the void.

“I don’t think people should assume that this is the final route map for bus service in the province,” he said, referring to routes Greyhound will maintain.

Ashton said the province anticipated there would be cuts to passenger service. He noted the network that remains is still much greater than Greyhound had planned when it threatened to close shop in Manitoba in September 2009.

Neil Henry of Prairie Coach Charter Services in Brandon said he’s not surprised Greyhound is cutting services.

“They just want out of it, ‘cause it costs them way too much money to do it,” Henry said. “And there’s no ridership out there, everybody drives now — we’ve all got cars.”

As for Henry picking up the business, he said that’s unlikely.

“We’re a charter bus company and that is more on seat sales and freight,” Henry said. “I don’t have any authority to do what they’re doing.”

» jaustin@brandonsun.com, with files from The Canadian Press, Winnipeg Free Press

Republished from the Brandon Sun print edition April 7, 2012