Langford’s green bus is rolling into the sunset — and so is its red-and-green trolley. The trolley has been a charming part of Langford’s character, but the bus was doomed from the start.
The trolley service, which shuttles people around the small city, and the Langtoria Greenline, which takes commuters into Victoria, will shut down on June 30. Both were created in typical can-do Langford fashion, although with very different results.
The old-style, rubber-wheeled trolley stopped at 21 spots in the West Shore over the course of an hour. It cost the city $90,000 to operate last year, but had cost as much as $230,000 in previous years.
Copied from trolleys such as those in Disneyland, it kicked off in 2007 to connect spots including Bear Mountain, the big-box store areas, Goldstream Avenue village and Juan de Fuca recreation complex. Mayor Stew Young was a driving force, and developers helped cover the $60,000 to buy the vehicle.
No studies or consultants’ reports were done beforehand, but the trolley soon became a familiar part of the revitalized Langford. After a 10-year run, however, the trolley is no longer needed because B.C. Transit has increased service to the area by 76 per cent, according to the city.
The Langtoria Greenline was created for a different purpose, but was also launched without studies and reports to gauge the demand. It was born in September and was operated by Wilson’s Transportation.
The goal was to help deal with the increasing bottleneck of commuter traffic on the Trans-Canada Highway between Langford and Victoria. With the McKenzie interchange still years from completion and rapid transit no more than a twinkle in a planner’s eye, the luxurious bus was conceived as a way to get at least some people out of their cars.
For a monthly cost of $110 or a daily cost of $15, commuters could relax in comfortable seats and connect with Wi-Fi. The bus even had a washroom. Those who took it say they loved it, especially compared to what one called being “jammed in like a sardine” on a transit bus.
Despite those attractions, just 18 regular riders spread themselves across the 50 seats. It wasn’t enough to keep the service viable.
Comfortable as the bus was, it couldn’t overcome some major handicaps.
Except for a few people, the service wasn’t door-to-door. Commuters usually had to get from home to the bus and then from the bus stop to work — and reverse the hassle on the way home.
That makes it hard to compete with a personal car, which can go door-to-door, saving time and aggravation. Except for the aggravation of the Colwood Crawl.
And even on that front, the bus didn’t offer much competition. Ideally, drivers stuck on the Trans-Canada Highway in the morning rush hour would glance over and see their neighbours zipping by in comfort on the green bus.
“Why don’t I do that?” they would say.
Unfortunately, the luxurious green bus wasn’t zipping by their passenger window. It was looming in the rear-view mirror, stuck in the same traffic jam as everyone else.
To entice more people out of their cars, those buses have to be able to whip past everyone else by using dedicated transit lanes. They have to go often and provide quick, convenient connections — as close as possible to door-to-door service.
The long-range plan is to extend the new dedicated bus lanes on Douglas Street all the way to the new McKenzie interchange, but that is years away. The Greenline was a bus too soon.
