Some thoughts on the proposed St. Mary’s Bay transit plan

Dear Editor:

Any St. Mary’s Bay public transit should also have smooth access to public transit that goes to town as well as transit to the other side of the Irish Loop that also ends up in St. John’s.

I know plenty of locals that would avail of public transit to the city or up the other side of the Irish Loop. As the community Postmaster, I hear of the many struggles to get to the city for medical appointments, family visits or even car repairs but also some of the older residents just have the desire to get up to Ferryland etcetera for an outing and a meal out around the bay with friends.

Additionally, the only tourists we get on this side of the Irish Loop are rich ones who can afford to hire a driver or rent a car. I maintain a Facebook group with 17,000 members as a tourist page for St. Vincent’s-St. Stephen’s-Peter’s River and have received many questions over the 12 years running this popular group about getting there on public transit. Most global tourists rely on public transit when they travel so are disappointed when they can’t get to a notable destination like our renowned whale watching beach. The province even has a separate page for our beach on their tourism site but no options to get there except by car rental.

And, with the new direct seasonal flight routes to three European destinations this is also an opportunity to secure a new market for European and world travelers that require public transit as their transportation mode when traveling. I met many tourists this season using these direct routes to detour to our Loop for a few days on their way to or from other Canadian destinations. If we add public transit on the entire Loop I suspect we would get many more.

So having a public transit run on the entire Irish Loop that had St. John’s as the anchor hub would benefit both St. Mary’s Bay locals and more budget minded tourists and could also encourage business development – especially those tourist operators who seek to provide niche experiences for travel influencers to ‘discover.’

I’m not sure what need there exists for rural transit only between North Harbour to Peter’s River. There’s only one inadequately staffed medical facility on the route and only one grocery store. There’s not even a coffee shop or restaurant.

In the short term I think the only possible consideration for public transit would be in the context of covering the entire Loop with St. John’s being the start and end point.

Orla Hegarty

Resident of St. Stephen’s since 2013