By MYNA LEE JOHNSTONE
I believe the service we get from BC Transit is failing us.
Ratepayers and all islanders should attend to this.
What is wrong with BC Transit?
1) They have provided buses that are now impossible to ride or feel safe on for many of us. Every crack or flaw in the road causes these buses to “bang, bang, shake and rattle” with new bangers happening every week. Ganges Hill with the roadwork underway? Forget it or suffer a lot.
Riders and our drivers should not have to endure this.
The older buses did not do that. They were sturdier diesel buses. They served us well for 15 years and were starting to break down after 300,000 kilometres.
BC Transit promised us new buses. What we got were used ones from Cowichan.
2) BC Transit dictates everything from Victoria. Schedules for routes going from the north part of the island to the south require people to wait in Ganges for half an hour or so.
3) In Ganges, buses have to come in from the north and do a loop past Thrifty Foods and the park before arriving at the info centre. We are not allowed to get off before that loop is done. We used to be able to get off earlier.
4) Buses used to pick up people along the way for the first morning run. Now the drivers are not allowed to do that until they have arrived at the info centre, so people needing to get to work early or to the ferry have to hitchhike or find some other means to transport themselves.
5) A requested stop at the Croftonbrook housing complex was denied by BC Transit.
You need to know that it is a private contractor here who does her best with what she is given. And we have excellent drivers, although they are not part of a union.
I have continuously brought these matters up as a past Salt Spring Island Transportation Commission member and now with transportation and transit under the Local Community Commission as a frequent delegate to their meetings. I conclude that no one sees the urgency of all of this, probably because they don’t experience it. I have urged them to take the bus, even just the Ganges Local route, and experience what I am telling them.
I conclude and believe we could do much better serving islanders with our own community van system. Inexpensive used vans could be used, or they could be electric ones purchased with a community fundraising campaign.
Where there is a will there’s a way.
This would help prevent congestion on roads, at ferries, at events and in and through Ganges, especially on Tuesday and Saturday market days.
We could be seen as a North American sustainable community with awards and rewards.
I have done the math. It would be economical!