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BC Transit cancels 33 trips during morning rush hour

Commuters faced backlogged buses on Wednesday morning
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BC Transit, bus

The morning commute was more of a scramble than usual on Wednesday after 33 trips on major routes were cancelled.

Between 6 a.m. and 8:45 a.m. trips on routes 4, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 21, 27, 30, 3, 46, 50 and 71 were cancelled, leaving people travelling between Langford, Royal Oak, UVic, Esquimalt and downtown hooped until another (and presumably more crowded) bus arrived.

An alert posted by BC Transit shows all the routes cancelled Wednesday morning. (BCtransit.com)

“We have seen a number of trip cancellations in Greater Victoria this morning as outlined in the customer alert,” said Jonathon Dyck, communications manager at BC Transit in an email. “We recognize that cancellations and detours are frustrating to customers, and apologize for the inconvenience this causes our customers.”

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The main reasons for the multiple cancellations, Dyck said, were due to driver illness, mechanical issues and congestion resulting in late buses.

“A key to the solution is the new replacement and expansion buses arriving throughout 2020 to improve reliability. This includes the introduction of 80 new replacement and expansion buses,” Dyck said. “We have recently received the first 12 of the new compressed natural gas buses and are slowly introducing them into service.”

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BC Transit also hopes that when the remainder of the south-bound bus lanes are open traffic will move more smoothly. It is also looking at making further upgrades to its maintenance facilities.

nicole.crescenzi@vicnews.com

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