‘HUGE BLOW’: Manitoba’s northern bus line announces final stop
Dave Baxter,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The sudden and unexpected shuttering of a northern Manitoba bus service will be a huge loss for northern communities, and leave them far more isolated from the rest of the province, a northern Manitoba mayor said.
“It’s just a huge blow to all the communities up here as far as I’m concerned,” Flin Flon Mayor George Fontaine said on Wednesday reacting to the news that the Mahihkan Bus Lines has announced they will cease operations on Sept. 6.
Mahihkan Bus Lines, which according to its website is 100% First Nations owned and operated, posted a statement on their Facebook page on Tuesday saying that they will cease operations next week.
“Despite our best efforts to sustain our business operations in order to provide a reliable transportation option for residents in northern Manitoba, ongoing market volatility, inflationary pressures and challenging economic circumstances have forced us to make this difficult decision,” the company said on their Facebook post.
Since being founded in 2019, Mahihkan Bus Lines has been running bus routes to and from several northern Manitoba communities to centres including Winnipeg, with the service currently offering routes between Winnipeg and Flin Flon, and Winnipeg and Thompson five days a week.
The service was launched just about a year after Greyhound Canada announced they were ending their long-time passenger bus service in western Canada, which previously offered bus services out of Flin Flon to communities in Manitoba, and across much of western Canada.
Fontaine called the loss of another long-distance bus service “devastating” for his community and for northern Manitoba.
“When we lost Greyhound that was already devastating because we lost the ability to travel to other provinces, and now with this news, we are losing one of the only routes to Winnipeg and to the south,” he said.
“Unfortunately when it comes to transportation in the north we just keep taking steps backwards.”
He added the bus route was important for people who didn’t own their own vehicles and for people who did, but didn’t feel safe doing long-distance trips on remote highways.
“I know from talking to people that a lot used that service even if they own their own vehicles, because they don’t always feel capable of making that drive to Winnipeg especially in the winter, and some of them are getting older, and don’t want to drive for hours,” Fontaine said.
For those who don’t own a vehicle, Fontaine said the shutdown of the service will leave them “isolated and vulnerable,” especially if they need to travel to other centres to access services like health care, or to be with family and friends.
“I’m certain this will lead to isolation in Flin Flon and in the other communities around here, because we saw it when Greyhound left, and we will see it again,” he said. “This is not a good thing for this community.”
Flin Flon borders the neighbouring community of Creighton, located on the Saskatchewan side of the border, and Fontaine said many who live in Saskatchewan have come to rely on the service as well as their only option to travel to southern Manitoba.
Fontaine said he believes simply continuing on without a long-distance bus service in northern Manitoba would do long-term harm to communities in the north, and he is calling on both governments and private organizations to come together to see if a solution can be found.
“I don’t know if it’s something where it needs to be subsidized, or a style of public transit, or some sort of hybrid model, but the bottom line is this is a service that needs to be replaced,” he said.
“Northern communities can’t be isolated.”
The Mahihkan Bus Lines has been owned and operated collaboratively by six northern Manitoba First Nations since being founded in 2019.
The company did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
Dave Baxter,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Winnipeg Sun
