If we’re going to replace Greyhound, let’s think outside the bus

A pair of stinging byelection losses last week don’t bode well for the Alberta NDP’s chances in rural Alberta in the next general election, and it’s unlikely that championing rural bus service is going to do much to change that.

Nonetheless, we can expect a full-court press on this issue in the aftermath of Greyhound’s announcement that it will be ending bus service right across Western Canada.

Premier Rachel Notley called it “disturbing and upsetting news,” and vowed to raise the issue this week at the Council of the Federation meeting in New Brunswick.

This issue was already a fixation for the NDP. They campaigned in 2015 on a promise to add more rural bus routes, and just four months ago, they announced funding for a pilot project to connect smaller municipalities with larger communities such as Lethbridge, Medicine Hat and Red Deer.

However, despite the government’s eagerness to intervene, it’s not at all clear that we need the government to solve this problem or that the solution here is a subsidized version of an antiquated model.

Greyhound has been facing declining ridership numbers for years now, and coupled with increased costs, these routes have become unsustainable.

We should be leery about throwing taxpayer money down that same black hole. Saskatchewan provides us with a cautionary tale.

Last year, the Saskatchewan government decided to scrap its government-run bus service, which would have needed another $85 million in subsidies to continue operating for another five years.

It was the same story there, too: declining ridership, with some routes averaging a handful of people per trip.

That’s not to say that demand for bus service has evaporated completely. Red Arrow is still running its routes in Alberta, as is its discounter bus carrier Ebus. Greyhound’s departure might create some opportunities for either of those bus lines — or other regional carriers that operate in Alberta — to expand their routes.

It’s rather premature for governments to conclude that intervention is a necessity before we have a better understanding of how the market is going to respond.

But if we’re convinced that inter-city bus transport is enough of a vital public service that it requires taxpayer subsidy, then at the very least, we should strive to ensure that subsidy is as minimal as possible.

A report from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy a few years ago, proposed that socalled “socially necessary routes” — those that might otherwise be unprofitable — be subject to a reverse auction system, which would reward routes to those companies requiring the least amount of subsidy. Such an approach might have the added benefit of not discouraging new market entrants. If the issue is, as Notley put it, “the ability to get from point A to point B,” then what’s to say it has to involve a bus?

It makes little sense for a bus to run a route with four or five passengers, but that might be a very worthwhile trip for someone driving a passenger van. We cannot discount the potential of ride-sharing as a significant part of the solution going forward. The ride-sharing industry is trying to drive that message home.

Last week, TappCar announced that it’s developing a long-commute service to connect rural communities with major centres, and it called on its rivals to do the same.

As a spokesman for TappCar noted, the “ride-share industry was built on innovation and ideas others said couldn’t work.” Let’s not make that mistake a second time.

Even outside of formal ridesharing, communities could do more to facilitate other services such as carpooling. Websites and apps exist to connect those offering and those seeking rides, and smaller municipalities could embrace that approach relatively quickly.

Again, it’s not clear how much of a crisis we actually face here or whether an urgent — and expensive — government solution is needed.

Instead, let’s employ patience, prudence and a willingness to think outside the box.