Prince George Citizen October 30, 2018 by Prince George Citizen

Tuesday, October 30, 2018 | Your community newspaper since 1916

CITZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

Low water mark With very low water levels in the rivers, people were walking on the bed of the Fraser River on Monday.

Bus company offers service to Langley Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff mnielsen@pgcitizen.ca A fledgling bus company is working to get a route between Prince George and Langley on the road. Merritt Shuttle Bus Services Ltd. is among a half-dozen applicants to have won Passenger Transportation Board permission to run long-haul services across B.C. through an expedited process as Greyhound Canada pulls out of Western Canada at the end of the month. With the go-ahead granted Friday, MSBS co-owner Gene Field said he and his partner and their spouses are working quickly to get everything in place by Nov. 21, the date the company must have at least two buses on the road under the PTB’s terms and conditions. The company won permission to run eight 22-passenger shuttle-sized buses along four routes centred on Merritt but also serving Prince George, Langley, Kamloops and Kelowna. Frequency of service along those routes must be at least three round trips a week. MSBS also won permission to run four 48-passenger buses twice a day between the Highland Valley Copper Mine and Merritt and Kamloops. Field said he expects the inter-community services to get going first because there is a deadline on an offer he has made to purchase the shuttle buses for those routes while he has more time to purchase the school buses the company will use to serve the routes to the mine. The service to Langley would be via Spences Bridge, meaning it will take a full day to make the trip but customers will pay

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CITIZEN PHOTO BY CHRISTINE HINZMANN

a significantly lower fare than Greyhound charged, said Field, although exact price points are still to be worked out. An online reservation system with schedules must be up and running by Nov. 7 to enable advance bookings. Field said he and his partners want to make a decent living from their venture but not much more. “We’re also very religious and we kind of said to God, we’re not doing this to make money, we’re doing this to provide a service and we know that because of that, what you put out in the universe comes back 10-fold,” he said. Neither Field, who is the operations director, nor partner David Brule, who is the marketing director, have previous experience in operating bus services. Their backgrounds include experience in the military, security and retailing. But Field said they will be hiring drivers with experience in trucking and bus driving and will be paying them as well as Greyhound was paying. In a licence application decision, PTB found Field and Brule have the “requisite knowledge and transferable skills and experience” to capably manage the venture. Between BC Bus North, through which Pacific Western provides service across northern B.C. under a one-year contract with the provincial government, and the six new licencees, Transportation and Infrastructure Minister Claire Trevena said private operators now cover 83 per cent of the routes Greyhound served. She said the PTB is still welcoming applications for eight routes including KamloopsValemount, Dawson Creek-B.C./Alberta border, Valemount-B.C./Alberta border and Fort Nelson-Yukon/B.C. border.

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Jennifer Cole, with daughter Erica, 7, and Erica’s dad, Matt Hutcheon, posed for a photo with Frankenstein during the Haunted Maze held in the 4-H Barn on the exhibition grounds.

Haunted Maze spooky family fun Christine HINZMANN Citizen staff chinzmann@pgcitizen.ca It wasn’t so scary to be caught in the Haunted Maze Sunday afternoon at the 4-H Barn on the exhibition grounds. But that’s because it was the kid-friendly version of the popular event that’s quickly becoming a Halloween tradition with a philanthropic twist as entry is by donation of either cash donated to Prince George Search and Rescue or non-perishable food items donated to St. Vincent de Paul Society. Hosted by a group of friends who started the event in a backyard three years ago and saw 2,000 people attend over the twonight event, more than 800 people went through the family-friendly maze Sunday and it looked like about the same number would come through again this week. “The kids really enjoyed it and we added a scavenger hunt to the event so children had to search for certain characters and get their sheet stamped so it was a bit more fun for them this year,” Jackie Bennett, one of the organizers, said. Dancing in place while waiting in the lineup to see Frankenstein was Matt

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Hutcheon and Jennifer Cole with daughter Erica, who’s seven years old. The family attended the event for the first time and enjoyed themselves. “It was awesome,” Erica said. Jennifer couldn’t help but catch the snazzy beat of the Rocky Horror Picture Show’s Time Warp and said it was the perfect maze for families. “It was nice to have a kid-friendly event – and an adult-who-doesn’t-like-to-bescared version,” Jennifer laughed while Matt called it like he saw it. “It’s for chickens!” Matt grinned. “The music was super fun and it’s fantastic to see the turnout from community – that’s really great, too. There was quite a lineup and that says the community is supporting all the hard work the organizers have done.” Sundays were reserved for families but the scare factor, experienced by thousands of Prince George residents, was jacked up a notch during the earlier evenings for the past two Fridays and Saturdays and then to full throttle fear later on during those same evenings. There’s still a chance to get completely terrified on Wednesday from 7 to 10:30 p.m.

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