People want to drive, not take train
Quite comical reading comments made by Jack Peake on why the island railway should be put back into service. Vancouver Island is not Europe. People on the island want to drive their own cars everywhere.
Previously the Wilson Group transportation put an express bus on from Langford to downtown Victoria which included free Wi Fi and a morning Times Colonist newspaper. The bus had to be taken out of service because there was only 12 people on the bus each day.
Presently the Vancouver Island Commuter/Tofino bus lines operates bus routs on the island from March 29 to Oct. 13 only. Why? During other times during the year, there is not enough passengers using the bus. Northbound service is on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Southbound service is on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and Mondays. There is only one bus each way per day.
Presently the CVRD has transit buses going to Nanaimo each day. The route starts at London Drugs in Duncan, and the bus leaves empty from Duncan.
Many years ago, my father was visiting from the mainland, and my wife said go and buy some train tickets for my dad, wife, son, and me and we can go to Courtenay on the passenger train. The fare cost was unbelievable, so I did not purchase the tickets. I asked the ticket agent why such outrageous fare costs and the agent said because the train does [not] make any profit because not enough people use the train. If Jack would have done his research he would have noticed that the island railway never made any profits on passenger service.
Before retirement, I lived in Lake Cowichan and drove to work in Victoria Monday to Friday return each week. When I got down to the Colwood crawl, every car around me had only the driver in the cars. This proved to me that nobody wanted to car pool to go to work. They preferred driving their own car to work and paying a monthly parking fee in downtown Victoria.
In summary with the above examples, I ask Jack why he insists 24/7 that the railway should be returned to operation when in fact there is not enough people that would use the service.
Unbelievable!
Joe Sawchuk
Duncan