As Greyhound Canada’s Halloween service cancellation looms closer and closer, a combination of government-subsidized, locally owned and ride-sharing services are moving in to take its place.

The motor coach operator announced in July it would be ending freight and passenger service in western Canada, save one route between Vancouver and Seattle.

Since the announcement, customers have begun turning to the alternative services and startups that have risen to fill Greyhound's place.

New services to fill the Greyhound gap

Greyhound’s announcement meant an opportunity to expand, says one Regina-based company, which launched an inner-provincial service after the government-owned Saskatchewan Transportation Company was shut down in 2017.

Last year, Rider Express began operating a handful of 15-passenger minibuses. Now, the company operates five full-sized 50-seat units with plans to launch a Vancouver-Calgary-Winnipeg route along the Trans-Canada Highway this week. A Highway 16 route between Edmonton and Saskatoon is planned for November.

Rider Express manager Shauna Hardy said the interest from Saskatchewan residents has been “overwhelming.”

The company, for the time being, has had to turn down offers to take on other routes.

In Manitoba, an Indigenous-owned charter service, newly named Mahihkan Bus Lines, has announced it will offer daily routes from Thompson and Flin Flon to Winnipeg. It will also offer a freight service.

And in May 2017, after Greyhound cancelled service to communities in northern British Columbia, Calgary’s Pacific Western Transportation (PWT) was hired by the province to operate its BC Bus North service.

John Stepovy, PWT’s director of business development, said Greyhound’s July announcement convinced the company to offer its own inter-city services in B.C. for the first time.

The company also has plans to expand its Alberta services.

Stepovy said PWT could be the hub in a hub-and-spoke business model, and is already talking to small-scale bus and transit operators about building connections with his firm’s routes.

“Overall, long-term, where the needs are, where there's demand, we would anticipate voids will be filled, but it could take a little bit of time for those things to shake out once the landscape changes," Stepovy said.

“Discount airlines coming in will probably take on some of that longer-haul (Greyhound demand)," he said. "For bus travel, that one-to-five/six-hour travel time is kind of in the sweet spot."

He expects “disruptors”—new travel options like Poparides, an app that matches passengers with drivers who happen to be going to the same destination—will fill the gap.

Alberta’s government has committed $2.8 million to pilot programs that will help five municipalities start inter-city bus services. A service centred on Camrose, 100 kilometers south of Edmonton, has already started, while the others are expected to begin over the next three months.

Why Greyhound failed in western Canada

The fragmented inter-city transportation model could be a positive change, says one expert.

According to a University of Manitoba professor, Greyhound’s failure in Western Canada was due to at least two reasons: its costs were too high, and its freight model made it inflexible to respond to changing markets.

"As long as they were in the market, it was hard for anyone else to come in. Now that they're gone, it creates an opportunity," said Barry Prentice, professor of transportation economics at the Asper School of Business.

Prentice thinks the emerging services—which plan to pick up and deliver customers at hotels, gas stations or tourist centres—won’t be burdened by a terminal network like Greyhound was.

Goodbye to Greyhound

Greyhound customers aren’t waiting for Greyhound’s last day to check out their new options, though. Ticket sales have fallen to the point that some route frequencies are being reduced, according to the company’s senior vice president.

“Demand is quite low as we run into this last week or 10 days,” Stuart Kendrick said in a recent interview.

“You've got single-digit riderships on the schedule that we have left throughout Western Canada, so that's probably about a 50 or 60 or 70 per cent decline based on what corridor you look at.”

Greyhound will stop selling tickets for long-distance trips a few days before service ends so that passengers aren’t left with an unused half of a two-way ticket, Kendrick said.

He added that shutting down Greyhound Canada’s routes will come at a “significant cost” for the company. The process is expected to take several months, as the company needs to sublet its leased real estate. It also has to sell the few facilities it owns, two of which are maintenance shops in Edmonton and Red Deer.

About 420 employees will be laid off in the closure.

Between 70 and 80 of Greyhound’s 110 buses in western Canada will be moved to its operations in the east. The rest will be sold or scrapped.

With files from The Canadian Press