Greyhound, what next?

In this previous post I examine what will happen now that Greyhound has decided to shut down operations in Western Canada.

In it, I made a number of predictions.

As we've passed the shut down and near the end of the year I'd like to look at how well (or poorly) I did. Lets go through this point by point.

No new rail service has been announced.

Nobody is buying the entire Greyhound network in the area as happened in the Maritimes.

Alberta company, myEbus has started a service between Vancouver and Kelowna, that continues on to Kamloops. Ebus says sales are slow and need to pick up if the route is to be maintained.

Alberta company Red Arrow, mentioned on my earlier post, is picking up the route from Edmonton to Grand Prairie. Despite my expectations, they are not expanding outside of Alberta much.

BC Bus North, a public company, will, for the time being, run routes in Northern BC, with a hub out of Prince George.

I can't find any information on connections from Vancouver to Prince George, beyond that a company based out of Merritt is trying to set up a route. What I'm reading leads me to believe there is a company already providing this service but I can not seem to find out who.

A first-nations owned company will be running buses from Thompson to Winnipeg.

Kaspar offers a service from Thunder Bay to Winnipeg, and Thunder Bay to White River, connecting that portion of the network.

The backbone of the network however will be taken over by Rider Express, the small Saskatchewan company. They will be running buses from Vancouver to Winnipeg. They are also opening a route connecting Edmonton to Winnipeg via Saskatoon.

In the end, the large majority of routes I outlined as "expected to be replaced" have been replaced; and a large number of other private services also exist that go into communities that I did not expect to retain service.

A nation-wide bus trip will not be easy however. My understanding is between Winnipeg and White River you may have to transfer as many as 4 times total. This makes the train a much more attractive option for those wishing to travel between Toronto/Ottawa/Montreal and Winnipeg.




Also take note that I'm working on a long blogpost, alternate history, about a "yes" side victory in the 1995 referendum. It's about half written, and will rank among the longer posts I've made for this blog.