TransLink mayors’ council makes B.C. election appeal [Video]

With the provincial election roughly one month away, Metro Vancouver mayors, business leaders and community groups made their pitch for increased public transit funding under B.C.’s next government, and asked the public to do the same.

Standing behind a podium emblazoned with the slogan “Save Transit,” Port Coquitlam Mayor Brad West reiterated the dire financial circumstances facing TransLink in the coming years.

Metro Vancouver’s regional transit authority faces a funding gap of approximately $600 million per year beginning in 2026. 

Without new funding, maintaining current levels of service will be impossible, and significant cuts – such as stopping bus service at 8 p.m., eliminating most bus routes in Langley, Delta, Maple Ridge and on the North Shore, and reducing SkyTrain service by one-third – will be necessary.

“This is not a bluff,” said West, who chairs the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation, TransLink’s governing body.

“This is not a ploy. This is not a bunch of BS designed to force the province to do something. This is reality.”

…