World's largest-reaching bus company hits the highway in Canada - CBC News | Canada News Media
Connect with us

News

World's largest-reaching bus company hits the highway in Canada – CBC News

Published

 on


FlixBus, a German company that says it’s the world’s largest-reaching bus provider, launched its Canadian operation this week in Toronto.   

“It’s a dream bus market for us,” said Pierre Gourdain, managing director of FlixBus North America, about rolling into Toronto with three flashy green coaches to start routes in Ontario.

That may sound like encouraging words for bus passengers and transportation advocates who felt abandoned when Greyhound pulled out of Canada in May 2021. 

The sleek silver dog had been limping along for years, saying many routes it had licences to operate weren’t sustainable before the pandemic stripped to the bone whatever market Greyhound had left.    

Experts say the arrival of FlixBus, which operates in 37 countries serving more than 2,500 destinations, is good news for bus customers, but it’s not clear if it will help underserved communities and whether private bus operators can create a national bus network without government support.       

“Given the catastrophic situation of the industry and the poor level of service we have in the country, that’s a really complex question,” said Jean-Baptiste Litrico, an associate professor of strategy at the Queen’s University Smith School of Business in Kingston, Ont. 

Starting small in big market Ontario

In essence, FlixBus is a tech company that partners with local bus companies who own the coaches and hire the drivers. 

It provides a ticket app and website, a pricing structure, route planning, and marketing, charging a 25 to 30 per cent commission on sales.  

The FlixBus plan is to establish profitable high volume routes between Ottawa and Toronto, Niagara Falls and Toronto and Waterloo and Toronto before developing routes with less demand.  

The company is moving into Canada after the nation’s largest province opened up its intercity bus industry to competition last summer. Deregulation in Ontario offers FlixBus and other carriers access to routes Greyhound couldn’t go after when it was here.   

Pierre Gourdain, managing director of FlixBus North America, says Canada is a ‘dream’ market for the company. Here he stands in front of passengers boarding the company’s first bus in Toronto. (James Dunne/CBC)

 

Flix also does research on customer demand and demographics and according to Gourdain, several key factors make Ontario and Quebec a “dream bus market” for the company. 

Gourdain said the provinces both have a “crazy high student population” and a lot of foreign students, who are frequent bus customers. 

The company also sees potential customers in the roughly 30 per cent of Toronto households that don’t own cars, and Gourdain believes their ticket app will appeal to the high number of Canadians who shop online.   

Where to next? Not small towns

This summer FlixBus plans to start cross-border routes into the U.S. from Ontario and B.C. The next priority will be to get a licence for routes in Quebec, where regulation remains a barrier to accessing the market.

The company isn’t rushing to create a national network or reach underserved communities, though some smaller destinations may come later. 

Gourdain said all bus carriers are struggling to recover from the pandemic, and FlixBus is no different.

“We are still at 50 to 70 per cent, in terms of demand, compared to pre-COVID,” he said.  

According to the American Bus Association, which tracks the industry in both the U.S. and Canada, almost 24 per cent of bus carriers went under in 2020, and in 2021 revenues were still 62 per cent below 2019 levels. 

Gourdain also said the company would likely develop several American markets, like Nashville, Tenn., and  St. Louis, Mo., before looking west to Canada’s Prairie cities. 

“First you start the Tier 1 routes, so be a bit patient with us,” said Gourdain.

Who’s going cross-country? 

Several regional carriers have maintained and even tried to expand service over the past few years in different parts of the country.  

Saskatchewan-based Rider Express is trying to span a big part of the country. 

“We are trying our best to provide national service,” said company owner Firat Uray.  

After starting out with two large vans for a Regina to Saskatoon route in 2017, Rider Express has grown to 20 buses, with plans to add another five as soon as possible.

Saskatchewan-based Rider Express is trying to provide national service, says company owner Firat Uray. Its customers can travel from Vancouver to Toronto. (James Dunne/CBC)

Using Rider Express and its partner Ontario Northland, customers can travel all the way from Vancouver to Toronto. It also has a number of routes in the western provinces.

It’s not an easy business, he said.   

“Some routes we make money, some routes we don’t make money and those two routes cover each other,” said Uray.  

“So that’s how we operate.”

Uray said he doesn’t imagine FlixBus will pursue much Prairie business.

“I don’t think they’re going to run those small cities,” he said.

However they will be rivals on the Toronto-Niagara route, which Rider Express is starting as well.  

German Flix Bus hits the highway in Canada

16 hours ago

Duration 1:55

Can this new player in the Canadian bus business help the sector turn a corner for the better? 1:55

Reaching underserved areas  

FlixBus also does interline with other bus companies, selling their tickets on its platform. But collaboration alone won’t solve the problem of servicing thinly populated areas in such a large country. 

In Canada, said Litrico, “it’s a problem that we see over and over again, in a number of essential public services, not just transportation.”

Jean-Baptiste Litrico, an associate professor of strategy at the Queen’s University Smith School of Business in Kingston, Ont., says Canada needs to figure out how to provide a level of intercity bus travel that’s equitable. (submitted by Jean-Baptiste Litrico)

With FlixBus being valued at more than $3 billion, and having bought Greyhound’s U.S. operations last year, it’s not asking for government support. Gourdain said help should go to small operators, to create more jobs.       

Uray said the government could help with fuel costs for operators in small centres or “by purchasing small vans for the local bus companies” in underserved rural areas. 

No matter what the approach, Litrico said governments have to address “how to protect and maintain the level of service that’s equitable.” 

Adblock test (Why?)



Source link

Continue Reading

News

Canada’s response to Trump deportation plan a key focus of revived cabinet committee

Published

 on

OTTAWA, W.Va. – U.S. president-elect Donald Trump’s promise launch a mass deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants has the Canadian government looking at its own border.

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said Friday the issue is one of two “points of focus” for a recently revived cabinet committee on Canada-U.S. relations.

Freeland said she has also been speaking to premiers about the issue this week.

“I do want Canadians to know it is one of our two central points of focus. Ministers are working hard on it, and we absolutely believe that it’s an issue that Canadians are concerned about, Canadians are right to be concerned about it,” Freeland said, after the committee met for the first time since Trump left office in 2021.

She did not provide any details of the plan ministers are working on.

Public Safety Minister Dominic Leblanc, whose portfolio includes responsibility for the Canada Border Services Agency, co-chairs the committee. Freeland said that highlights the importance of border security to Canada-U.S. relations.

There was a significant increase in the number of irregular border crossings between 2016 and 2023, which the RCMP attributed in part to the policies of the first Trump administration.

The national police service said it has been working through multiple scenarios in case there is a change in irregular migration after Trump takes office once again, and any response to a “sudden increase in irregular migration” will be co-ordinated with border security and immigration officials.

However, Syed Hussan with the Migrant Rights Network said he does not anticipate a massive influx of people coming into Canada, chalking the current discussion up to anti-migrant panic.

“I’m not saying there won’t be some exceptions, that people will continue to cross. But here’s the thing, if you look at the people crossing currently into the U.S. from the Mexico border, these are mostly people who are recrossing post-deportation. The reason for that is, is that people have families and communities and jobs. So it seems very unlikely that people are going to move here,” he said.

Since the Safe Third Country Agreement was modified last year, far fewer people are making refugee claims in Canada through irregular border crossings.

The agreement between Canada and the U.S. acknowledges that both countries are safe places for refugees, and stipulates that asylum seekers must make a refugee claim in the country where they first arrive.

The number of people claiming asylum in Canada after coming through an irregular border crossing from the U.S. peaked at 14,000 between January and March 2023.

At that time, the rule was changed to only allow for refugee claims at regular ports of entry, with some specific exemptions.

This closed a loophole that had seen tens of thousands of people enter Canada at Roxham Road in Quebec between 2017 and 2023.

In the first six months of 2024, fewer than 700 people made refugee claims at irregular crossings.

There are 34,000 people waiting to have their refugee claims processed in Canada, according to government data.

In the first 10 months of this year, U.S. border officials recorded nearly 200,000 encounters with people making irregular crossings from Canada. Around 27,000 encounters took place at the border during the first 10 months of 2021.

Hussan said the change to the Safe Third Country Agreement made it less likely people will risk potentially dangerous crossings into Canada.

“Trying to make a life in Canada, it’s actually really difficult. It’s more difficult to be an undocumented person in Canada than the U.S. There’s actually more services in the U.S. currently, more access to jobs,” Hussan said.

Toronto-based immigration lawyer Robert Blanshay said he is receiving “tons and tons” of emails from Americans looking at possibly relocating to Canada since Trump won the election early Wednesday.

He estimates that about half are coming from members of the LGBTQ+ community.

“I spoke to a guy yesterday, he and his partner from Kansas City. And he said to me, ‘You know, things weren’t so hunky-dory here in Kansas City being gay to begin with. The entire political climate is just too scary for us,'” Blanshay said.

Blanshay said he advised the man he would likely not be eligible for express entry into Canada because he is at retirement age.

He also said many Americans contacted him to inquire about moving north of the border after Trump’s first electoral victory, but like last time, he does not anticipate many will actually follow through.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024



Source link

Continue Reading

News

Surrey recount confirms B.C. New Democrats win election majority

Published

 on

VANCOUVER – The British Columbia New Democrats have a majority government of 47 seats after a recount in the riding of Surrey-Guildford gave the party’s candidate 22 more votes than the provincial Conservatives.

Confirmation of victory for Premier David Eby’s party comes nearly three weeks after election night when no majority could be declared.

Garry Begg of the NDP had officially gone into the recount yesterday with a 27-vote lead, although British Columbia’s chief electoral officer had said on Tuesday there were 28 unreported votes and these had reduced the margin to 21.

There are ongoing recounts in Kelowna Centre and Prince George-Mackenzie, but these races are led by John Rustad’s B.C. Conservatives and the outcomes will not change the majority status for the New Democrats.

The Election Act says the deadline to appeal results after a judicial recount must be filed with the court within two days after they are declared, but Andrew Watson with Elections BC says that due to Remembrance Day on Monday, that period ends at 4 p.m. Tuesday.

Eby has said his new cabinet will be announced on Nov. 18, with the 44 members of the Opposition caucus and two members from the B.C. Greens to be sworn in Nov. 12 and the New Democrat members of the legislature to be sworn in the next day.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



Source link

Continue Reading

News

Port of Montreal employer submits ‘final’ offer to dockworkers, threatens lockout

Published

 on

 

MONTREAL – The employers association at the Port of Montreal has issued the dockworkers’ union a “final, comprehensive offer,” threatening to lock out workers at 9 p.m. Sunday if a deal isn’t reached.

The Maritime Employers Association says its new offer includes a three per cent salary increase per year for four years and a 3.5 per cent increase for the two subsequent years. It says the offer would bring the total average compensation package of a longshore worker at the Port of Montreal to more than $200,000 per year at the end of the contract.

“The MEA agrees to this significant compensation increase in view of the availability required from its employees,” it wrote Thursday evening in a news release.

The association added that it is asking longshore workers to provide at least one hour’s notice when they will be absent from a shift — instead of one minute — to help reduce management issues “which have a major effect on daily operations.”

Syndicat des débardeurs du port de Montréal, which represents nearly 1,200 longshore workers, launched a partial unlimited strike on Oct. 31, which has paralyzed two terminals that represent 40 per cent of the port’s total container handling capacity.

A complete strike on overtime, affecting the whole port, began on Oct. 10.

The union has said it will accept the same increases that were granted to its counterparts in Halifax or Vancouver — 20 per cent over four years. It is also concerned with scheduling and work-life balance. Workers have been without a collective agreement since Dec. 31, 2023.

Only essential services and activities unrelated to longshoring will continue at the port after 9 p.m. Sunday in the event of a lockout, the employer said.

The ongoing dispute has had major impacts at Canada’s second-biggest port, which moves some $400 million in goods every day.

On Thursday, Montreal port authority CEO Julie Gascon reiterated her call for federal intervention to end the dispute, which has left all container handling capacity at international terminals at “a standstill.”

“I believe that the best agreements are negotiated at the table,” she said in a news release. “But let’s face it, there are no negotiations, and the government must act by offering both sides a path to true industrial peace.”

Federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon issued a statement Thursday, prior to the lockout notice, in which he criticized the slow pace of talks at the ports in Montreal and British Columbia, where more than 700 unionized port workers have been locked out since Nov. 4.

“Both sets of talks are progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved,” he wrote on the X social media platform.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Source link

Continue Reading

Trending

Exit mobile version