“Public transit investment needs to be a saviour to possible recession from a trade war, not the victim of it.”
-Michael Hall, Volunteer, Movement

For Immediate Release
March 4, 2025

VANCOUVER – Today, the BC Government announced their annual budget. It was characterized as a “stay the course” budget, with great care taken to preserve essential services in the face of economic headwinds.

This budget did not address the risk of excruciating cuts to Metro Vancouver’s bus and rail network. If the different levels of government do not come to an agreement on operating funding for TransLink in the next few weeks, 50% of bus service might need to be cut, as well as 30% of rail service. 

We’ve known about the impending cuts for nearly a year, but this budget signals that they are no longer theoretical. The risk of a transit apocalypse in Metro Vancouver has become incredibly real. 

In the face of a recession caused by our southern neighbour, transit service becomes even more essential. If we’re concerned that family expenses will rise and incomes will drop, transit is one of the only options working-class people have to save money. 

Cities like Maple Ridge and Port Coquitlam could lose every single transit route they have. Others like Coquitlam and West Vancouver could be left with a single bus route. 

Others will retain their bus routes, but at a much lower frequency, and with service ending as early as 8pm. Overcrowding on buses and car congestion will make these buses, and our streets, totally unusable. 

Movement implores elected officials at all levels to please come to an agreement that centers the dignity of Metro Vancouverites. We deserve decent, reliable transit. 

Also, we implore any elected officials to let us know what you are doing (and we ask journalists to ask them about it). We have not received any updates about the negotiations from any elected officials, at all. 

What Metro Vancouverites need

• The mayors, province and feds need to come to an agreement on a funding solution that ends this constant cycle of crisis and public begging. 
• The funding provided should be sufficient to ensure that:
  • no one is turned away by full buses, and that 
  • no one has less transit service than in January 2020. Overcrowding and waits have reached critical levels in many parts of Metro Vancouver; especially those neighbourhoods that are affordable to the working class. 

What we’re going to do about it

Over the next few weeks, we will ramp up our efforts to mobilize riders and supporters across the region to reach out to their MLAs. We’ll be eagerly tracking the responses they receive, and recording their testimonials to share on social media. 

What you can do about it

• Reach out to your MLA. Call, e-mail, or use our letter generator. Ask for a meeting if you can at savethebus.ca 
• Record a video of yourself talking about how transit cuts affect your life and send it to us! hello@movementyvr.ca
• If you know anyone who knows an MLA, please reach out to them and ask them to personally reach out.
• If you see an MLA at a party, please ask them about transit. 
• If you are part of an organization – a club, union, or faith group, please ask the organization’s leadership to send a letter or make a call to their MLA or the premier.

Quotes

“Can you imagine the number of people who would be stranded? It’s unbelievable. While many are trying to push us out of vehicles and into transit, at the same time, we’re seeing transit possibly being starved into reduction. . . Why are cuts to service even an option?

My young person in my household – that’s how he moves through the world. If he did not have access to the transit that he does, it would be terrible. He can’t afford a car, he can’t afford insurance, he can’t afford gas, he can’t afford any of it. And I think he represents a large portion of the community that really relies on transit.” 

–Jody Vance, CKNW radio host

“Well I wouldn’t be able to get anywhere because I don’t drive and I don’t cycle. Public transit is my primary means of transportation around the city and that’s how I get places. So if the bus completely stopped, I basically wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

-Anjali, transit rider

“TransLink has estimated the gazillion-dollar impact of these cuts, but do you really need to see the impact quantified as a percentage of our GDP? Or do you understand, in the core of your being, the impact of being cut off from the places and people that matter to you?”

“Who will step up and be our hero? It might be your MLA. Please reach out to them. You can use our website to do so, but calls, texts, and personal e-mails are better. If you have a pre-existing relationship with them, your outreach counts for even more.”

-Denis Agar, Executive Director, from yesterday’s op-ed in Daily Hive

“I’m currently studying Physics at UBC. If I can’t get to school, then I might have to drop out, or I might have to pay for a taxi every day. This really keeps me up at night.”

-Chris Ng, Volunteer in Richmond

“So in a time when we need to be expanding transit across the region, we are instead fighting to maintain the status quo”

-Arden English, Volunteer in White Rock

“I grew up in the US, where my local government decided to stop funding city services, and all of the school’s buses shut down as a result. Every day for two years, hundreds of cars lined up outside a tiny school in suburbia, just to drop kids off or pick them up. Most of them with no more than two people in the car.

I came to Vancouver over 10 years ago because I wanted to live somewhere sane. I’m worried that the lack of Translink Operational Funding in the new BC Budget jeopardizes everything that makes Metro Vancouver work.

That tiny town I came from in the US only had 10,000 people, but the lack of school buses still disrupted everything. What’s going to happen in Metro Vancouver if TransLink’s operating funding isn’t restored?

Ultimately, people can’t exist in a city if they don’t have the freedom to move around in it.”

-Stephen Rouse, Volunteer in Burnaby