Virden’s Greyhound Bus depot has moved from the Trans-Canada Highway frontage road to the Custom Creations store.
As of last weekend, the buses are picking up and dropping off passengers and freight in downtown Virden. The bus depot office is now located at the rear of Custom Creations and is accessed from the back lane.
Bobbie Heaman is the Greyhound Bus agency manager in Virden and the owner of Custom Creations. She says it was a financial decision prompted by the faltering oil economy.
“It’s mainly the decrease in freight traffic due to the downturn in oil. The oil industry was our main customer for packages because of Greyhound’s next-day service.”
Ridership down
Heaman says passenger numbers are also down, especially to and from Winnipeg since Greyhound cut one of its daily buses and changed its scheduling.
She says one job has been lost as a result of moving the depot to her store where staff can manage the counter.
The bus schedule is not changing, and the 4 p.m. bus through Virden will continue to drop passengers at the restaurants on the highway for a lunch break while the bus driver attends to parcels and new passengers at the depot downtown.
Heaman says Greyhound was open to the idea of moving the lunch stop downtown since the bus has to go there anyway but she says the eateries she asked for feedback weren’t interested.
The upside
There are several upsides to the move, according to Heaman. People who found the depot’s previous location inconvenient will likely be pleased to see it return downtown.
And because it’s in a retail store, the depot can be open six days a week instead of five as before and longer hours.
“I think this will be a good move. It will streamline our costs and make things easier for seniors who before had to get a ride out to the bus,” said Heaman.
