Translink offers Victoria’s ferry foot passengers little time savings with new Skytrain
Metro Vancouver’s newest Skytrain route, the $2 billion Canada Line, connects the northern half of Richmond (including the Vancouver International Airport) and downtown Vancouver. However, in a bizarre twist of transit planning for foot passengers from Victoria traveling between BC Ferry’s Tsawwassen terminal and downtown Vancouver via public transit, travel times are not about to get any faster. Translink, the transportation authority of Metro Vancouver, was quoted by the Times Colonist announcing a bus route connecting the Bridgeport Canada Line Skytrain station in Richmond with the Tsawwassen ferry terminal. What Translink failed to announce was the estimated travel time by bus between the ferry terminal and Bridgeport station (bus #620, traveling 40 to 42 minutes with 11 stops) and the estimated travel time between Bridgeport station and downtown Vancouver (19 minutes) is approximately 1 hour. I.e., virtually identical to the previous bus-only transit connection.
Pacific Coach Lines, a private company offering coach services between downtown Victoria and Vancouver’s Pacific Central station off of Main Street, charges $43 for a one-way fare for the service. Travel time between Tsawwassen terminal and Pacific Central is 55 minutes. Travelers heading into downtown Vancouver must pay an additional $2.50 to catch a bus or a Skytrain into downtown and pad their travel time accordingly.
Translink’s failure to expedite travel between Tsawwassen and downtown Vancouver with the introduction of a Skytrain route extending towards the ferry terminal is a significant planning oversight that fails the tax payers who helped fund Vancouver’s newest rapid transit project.
To follow the discussion on BC Ferries and the new transit connection between the Tsawwassen terminal and downtown Vancouver, please refer to this thread in the VibrantVictoria.ca discussion forum.
Copyright © 2009 by VibrantVictoria.ca. All rights reserved.
Responses to this Headline or Article
The five most recent replies to VibrantVictoria.ca's discussion forum's BC Ferries thread, the most relevant thread to the above headline or article:
jonny
May 19, 2012 at 10:30 amQuote: So did we figure outwhy the Celebration was in Esquimalt? Could they be trying her out for a new form of rapid transit between Langford and Victoria perhaps? :p
I told you already.
sebberry
May 19, 2012 at 11:16 amOops, sorry captain. I didn't see that reply.
Scheduled refit already? We just bought the damn thing. :p If it needs oil and a filter then surely they could have done that before the long weekend :confused:
jonny
May 19, 2012 at 3:53 pmQuote: Oops, sorry captain. I didn't see that reply.
Scheduled refit already? We just bought the damn thing. :p If it needs oil and a filter then surely they could have done that before the long weekend :confused:
"You" bought the "damn thing" 4 years ago. Just because they are relatively new doesn't mean you don't maintain them.
Refits are scheduled years in advance for regulatory inspections, extraordinary maintenance, overhauls and upgrades. For those armchair experts out there, passenger ships require a bit more than an oil and filter change. For instance, life saving and fire fighting systems are inspected and approved by Transport Canada annually. On a ship like this with inflatable life rafts, the rafts and slides have to be deployed, inspected and replaced every year.
AllseeingEye
May 19, 2012 at 5:22 pmQuote: ^ Yes, I was gonna say, share?. Don't tease us like that.
I'll see if I can get my friend to whom I sent that pic originally, to send it back my way so I can post it; I shot them from my blackberry then deleted the pictures eventually after sending to them to an old friend who is ex-RCN; I knew he would like to see a shot of the
sebberry
May 19, 2012 at 5:57 pmQuote:
Refits are scheduled years in advance for regulatory inspections,
So they
.
