#50 rerouted off Granville Mall on weekends and holidays, Apr 30 to Oct 31
#50 rerouted off Granville Mall on weekends and holidays, Apr 30 to Oct 31
Riders of the 50 Waterfront Station/False Creek South, heads up!
From April 30 to October 31, 2010, the Vancouver Police Department, in coordination with the City of Vancouver, will close down sections of the Granville Mall to provide more space for pedestrians in the entertainment district and improve public safety.
These closures will take place on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays/holidays and evenings before stat holidays, between 9pm and 5am the next morning.
As such, the 50 will be regularly scheduled off the Granville Mall during these times, using Seymour northbound and Howe southbound instead of Granville. (During all other time periods, it will remain on regular route.)
Check the top picture for the exact reroute, or download this PDF for a much larger version of the reroute map.
Are the mall closures going to affect all the other bus routes expected to return to Granville?
Yes, but they will be watching the earlier closures to see how to mitigate that impact. Here’s what I’m told by CMBC Planning:
Seems like it might be easier for riders if the 50 just stayed on one route [I guess off Granville]
It sounds to me, that there WILL be mass confusion! And this brings up the big/main question, WHY are we going back onto Granville Mall, if we then have to detour evenings and weekends???
QUICK, make the decision to keep all services on Seymour and Howe instead, and cut our losses with Granville Mall!!!
I agree with Sean. Things moved off Granville for a long time and people have adjusted to it. [I was actually surprised when the 50 moved back] I think having the route for it move around is weak idea [especially given that it’s a wheelchair accessible bus–people need to know where it’s going to be without thinking through a formula]
I’m passing your comments along for an answer… stay tuned!
It does seem like it would be less confusing just to have it operate on Howe+ Seymour all the time, rather than rerouting it 3 nights a week.
I got excited when I saw your blog title – thinking they were creating pedestrian spaces on the weekend at least, but it’s only in the evenings – so it’s really just space for drunk people (which is important). Why don’t the rest of us get pedestrian space? i.e. saturday afternoon?
Sorry if I sound whiny, but I’m really enjoying Granville as a vehicle-free zone and I’m quite sad that I’m losing it, given the fact that transit has operated fine on Howe & Seymour for 2+ years.
Some consistency would be nice. Either the buses are on the mall 100% or they can go back to Howe and Seymour.
Granville Station is in a bit of an awkward location when you think about it. It has entrances off Granville and Dunsmuir and the entrance on Seymour is on the ‘wrong’ side!
Some cities use buses with doors on the left side for centre boulevards and one way streets, but here it’s just that one stop.
Solutions are never easy are they? The most practical are always the most expensive.
The 100% rule is a great idea, because I find that the routes and schedules are hard to memorize, if I need to remember all these exceptions to the rules.
For me, it’s the #319 & the #340 schedules. Please have more consistency. :^)
I like my transit on Granville. It’s much closer to the Canada Line VCS station. I only wished it went all the way along Granville.
If people can keep track which service runs only during rush hour, they can remember and read the change signs for 3 nights a week.
make it back to granville and have them going down there 24/7. The weekend shutdown was well after the reroute went into place like 2008 and buses did move well on the weekends down granville.
I think buses can stay on Granville all the time even during weekend night closures. I hate walking to Seymour or Howe St. to catch my buses as it is, return them to Granville stat!!!
Crompton, Sean:
I sent your comments on to CMBC Planning and here is the response.
Maybe the solution is to have the reroute in effect e-v-e-r-y- night after the same/certain time, so that it’s not Wednesday night here, but Friday night there???
Have the detour every night after say 9pm, or whatever time you come up with… That could help reduce confusion..
I’ve passed your suggestion along Sean.
Oh, look at that, CMBC has sent along a response to your idea, Sean.
We’ll see how this goes, I suppose…
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