VICTORIA – BC Transit and the Victoria Regional Transit Commission will be introducing service expansion and changes on January 2, 2018. The service expansion builds off of the 20,000 additional service hours that have been implemented throughout the fall.
The main communities affected by the new service changes will be James Bay and the Tsawout First Nation.
The changes in James Bay were created with input from the local community in the fall of 2016, and align with the Transit Future Action Plan for Victoria. The changes to the service in James Bay provide more direct routing to Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria High School, Central Middle School and Oak Bay.
Service changes affecting the Tsawout First Nation come into effect after consultation with the Tsawout First Nation and the District of Central Saanich.
Changes include:
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Route 2 Oak Bay/Willows/Downtown will provide service to Fisherman’s Wharf and Five Corners (Menzies Street and Simcoe Street) before connecting to downtown Victoria and continuing to Oak Bay.
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Route 3 Beacon Hill/Gonzales will expand to turn north onto Foul Bay Rd., connecting with the Royal Jubilee Hospital, where it will continue as route 10 Royal Jubilee/Songhees to Vic West.
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Routes 7 Uvic/Downtown and 21 Camosun Interurban/Downtown are now connected, removing the need to change buses on select trips.
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Route 19 Hillside Mall, which provided service from James Bay to Hillside Mall, will be discontinued and replaced by the expanded route 2 Oak Bay/Willows/Downtown.
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Routes 27 Gordon Head/Downtown and 28 Majestic/Downtown will now terminate at the Blanshard Terminus downtown, and no longer circulate through James Bay. The route will be replaced by route 2 Oak Bay/Willows/Downtown.
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Routes 30 Royal Oak Exchange/ Beacon Hill/ James Bay and 31 Royal Oak Exchange/James Bay will now terminate at the Legislature Terminus, and no longer circulate through James Bay. The route will be replaced by route 2 Oak Bay/Willows/Downtown.
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Route 50 Langford Exchange will start earlier on Saturday and Sunday.
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Route 61 Sooke will have three extra round trips added creating hourly service from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and will start earlier on Saturdays and Sundays.
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Route 82 Sidney will be expanded to better serve the Tsawout First Nations community.
To support these changes, BC Transit will be on hand to help customers by having staff at main bus stops explaining the new routing during the first week of January. BC Transit will also provide presentations and travel training to community groups upon request.
Beyond the service expansion and changes, our regular winter service change effective January 2 will reinstate service on routes around universities and colleges that was reduced in response to lower ridership levels in December.
For more information on the winter service changes, please visit BCTransit.com/victoria or call 250-382-6161.
Media Contact:
Jonathon Dyck
Communications Manager
BC Transit
250-995-5720
media@bctransit.com
