Buses are back and ride-sharing prices have dropped as strike pauses in Metro Vancouver

Metro Vancouver saw a very different commute Wednesday morning as the ongoing strike action took a mandated pause, and TransLink bus and SeaBus service temporarily resumed.

As of 3 am, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) 4500 was forced to allow its 180 members to return to work, as their 48-hour strike action limit had passed, and with the picket lines down, that allowed the 5,000 other Coast Mountain Bus employees to also resume their duties.

However, that’s not to mean the picket lines won’t be back up on Thursday.

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Plus, the threat that the union representing Expo Line and Canada Line workers will also be involved looms. A hearing on Monday will decide if CUPE 4500 union members can legally picket SkyTrain stations, which would prevent the union members from being unable to cross those picket lines and operate the trains.

The house of cards for commuters has many people taking their frustrations to social media.

“Fire the 180 striking grossly overpaid transit supervisors holding hostage millions of consumers !!” one person wrote on X.

Bus drivers and TL staff will not be welcome at any of my family’s cafes tomorrow.

— Cal Wanger (@CalWaggs) January 24, 2024

I would boycott @TransLink . They had zero care about the people they service and how those people would commute around. They continue to ask for more and more money and provide a worse and worse service. #Vancouver should make a statement and avoid using the bus system for 48rs

— JS (@j_sarai) January 24, 2024

Meanwhile, as bus service resumed Wednesday, the price to take an Uber or Lyft had dropped significantly over the previous day.

Uber has maintained that it has imposed a cap on surge pricing, a payment model that fluctuates based on demand, but it’s unclear if Uber will restore that cap if the strike continues this week.

$160 this morning from
North van to YVR. It’s criminal

— Jonathan Tchao (@Jtchao83) January 24, 2024

Also, many argued the cap wasn’t effective as they still saw prices way above average, including a $160 trip to the airport from North Vancouver.

A screenshot of Uber on Wednesday, January 24. (Uber)

On Wednesday morning, that price was closer to $70.

Are you impacted by the job action? Let us know in the comments.

With files from Kenneth Chan