Maple Ridge has received a big boost in bus service.
Two new bus lines to the northern suburb of Silver Valley will begin Sept. 4.
The new service will be allow residents of those neighbourhoods to be within a five-minute walk of a bus stop, TransLink said in a news release Aug. 22.
“The new routes into the Blaney and Forest hamlets in Silver Valley will provide access for our citizens, especially youth, who have not been able to easily access services in the city centre and connect to the existing transit network,” Mayor Nicole Read said in a release.
“We appreciate the extensive marketing that TransLink is doing to launch this new service. It is important for our citizens to have options to reduce their dependence on cars.”
There will be two buses to Silver Valley, on 45-minute intervals. One, the 733 Rock Ridge-Haney Place bus, will run up and down 232nd Street and up to 133rd Avenue. The bus will connect with Haney Place Mall then loop down to Port Haney Station so people can jump on to the West Coast Express. It replaces the old C47 community shuttle.
Another new bus, the 741 Anderson Creek-Haney Place bus, will run along 227th Street and up to Silver Valley Road and Foreman Drive. It will also connect to Haney Place Mall and the Port Haney Station.
The additional bus service is part of Phase 1 of TransLink’s 10-Year Vision for Metro Vancouver Transportation. Under that plan Maple Ridge also gets five new passenger cars for the West Coast Express commuter rail, plus a B-line bus service from downtown Maple Ridge to Coquitlam Central SkyTrain station in 2019.
Maple Ridge’s new bus lines are part of an increase of 105,000 in bus service hours across Metro Vancouver.
