Photo: A TransLink bus in downtown Vancouver. Marc Bruxelle / Shutterstock.com
With a tentative agreement in place to avert a planned three-day bus and SeaBus shutdown in Metro Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»starting today, TransLink is still cautioning customers they may experience some delays as they operators resume regular service.
Just before 12:30 Wednesday morning, Coast Mountain Bus Company and Unifor came to a tentative agreement to ratify employee contracts for SeaBus and bus operators at TransLink. Unifor extended the deadline by 30 minutes and into Wednesday as they were so close to reaching the deal at which they ultimately arrived.
While details of the agreement will remain undisclosed until Unifor members fully ratify the new contracts, the midnight hour and last-minute decision brought an end to the planned service shutdown set to begin later in the morning.
Because the agreement was made so late, TransLink cautions bus passengers may still face some residual delays Wednesday: "Thank you customers! As we work towards resuming regular service, please prepare for longer than usual wait times for buses," reads the top alert on their webpage.
Due to the previous job action, the remains a backlog of maintenance work that is being addressed as regular service resumes, however about five- to 10 per cent of service will be affected today.
A small handful of early-morning bus trips have been cancelled Wednesday.
Bus riders are asked to double check the in the event a cancellation affects their usual routes and trips.
