Bus Bullying???

I heard the end of this story on the radio earlier, and now have found it in entirety...

Greyhound Canada said Thursday that unless it gets $15 million in government aid, it will cease passenger bus operations in Manitoba and northwestern Ontario because it is being forced to operate unprofitable rural routes without government help.

Now this town lost Greyhound service last year. ANd someone stepped in to partially (almost fully) fill teh gap. ANd I could see why Greyhound stopped the route, it had to be losing bigtime money on it given the amount of use it was getting. I could see the logic of threatening to stop or cut back servicing underused routes. But to simply cut a great big hole in national service? To stop servicing a province 2 months after opening a multi-million dollar terminal in the provincial capital? THis is good business practice?

This time (although I hate to admit it) I have to agree with the federal government. It smells like bullying. IT smells like a money grab. After all, as you read further you find that they are not only threatening Ontario and MAnitoba but all of WEstern Canada.

Time will tell if they get away with it.

PS> this has been a few years building. MAny of the rural routes used to be served by Grey Goose Lines but ever since they were bought out by/merged with Greyhound there has been pressure to cut back on this service. Unfortunately this service is a vital lifeline for many in those small communities (for simple little things like medical appointments, you know not that those are important...)