Things went far from smoothly in the first day of curtailed Vitran bus service on St. Thomas and St. John, and yet it could have been worse.
As Verne Callwood, Public Works assistant commissioner for transportation planning, put it, St. Thomas experienced a "few bumps." At the Vitran terminal office in Contant, he said the number of drivers reporting for work in the morning came up short by two. As a result, while five buses were scheduled to be in operation, only three were out on the road for the first shift.
However, Callwood said, the reason the employees did not report for work was that, under their old schedule, Thursday had been their regular day off.
Callwood said Vitran is required by union contract to send out layoff notices two weeks in advance, but nobody had reckoned on the layoff date falling in the middle of the week. "We're all to blame on that one," he said.
As luck would have it, the demand for public transit was less than it might have been under other circumstances. There were no cruise ships in port at St. Thomas on Thursday. It was, in fact, the first such day since Hurricane Lenny visited the territory in November, according to Jimmy Danet, officer manager for The West Indian Company. As a result, a lot of safari bus and taxi drivers were on the road looking to pick up local fares who might not otherwise have been available to do so.
In addition, intermittent showers during the day across the island may have dissuaded those who did not have to go out and travel on public transit.
There were no signs of would-be riders stuck waiting at bus stops. In fact, with the off- and-on rain, most downtown and West End stops were virtually deserted outside of the morning and afternoon rush hours.
On St. John, Vitran operations manager Donna Roberts said the first day of running a decimated system with an all-new staff was rocky. Her entire St. John crew was laid off because of a lack of seniority, since Vitran began operating on the island only three years ago, and five St. Thomas employees were transferred to St. John.
However, Roberts said, first thing Thursday morning, one laid-off driver was called back – – and came back — because one of the two St. Thomas drivers scheduled to begin service at 5:15 a.m. was late.
Then, she said, that bus, one of just two operating on the island, went out of service, and a mechanic had to be called over from St. Thomas.
Callwood said the St. Thomas driver who reported on time in the morning has family on St. John and had spent the night there. Drivers newly assigned to work on St. John are expected to make their own arrangements to be able to report for work at their scheduled starting times.
The "day-off" bug bit on St. John, too, in the afternoon. Roberts said one worker assigned to the second shift didn't show up "because Thursday was his regular day off." She added, "I couldn't blame him, because he worked all week and he wanted to take his day off."
Roberts said she was glad she had prepared a contingency plan on Wednesday while working out the new bus schedule. She predicted that by Sunday, the system should be running smoothly.
On Sundays, there will be "restricted" bus service on St. John but none on St. Thomas or St. Croix. The impact this will cause for places of worship remains to be seen, but a clergyman at one major downtown St. Thomas church expressed concern. The Rev. Clifton Niles of Christ Church Methodist at Rothschild Francis "Market" Square said his congregation members would have to get together to work out car pools or other alternatives to taking the bus. "To be honest, I don't know how we are going to handle it right now," he said Thursday.
At another downtown church, the Frenchtown Evangelistic Assembly, which has just constructed a new house of worship on Veterans Drive, Pastor Edward Magras said the absence of Vitran service would not be a problem. "We have our own safari bus, which the church subsidizes," he explained, "so we aren't concerned."
There was no word from Government House Thursday on any new developments in the public transit situation. Administration officials had said Wednesday that financial analysts were weighing legislation appropriating $600,000 for Vitran operations and a union offer for employees to go to a four-day work week and forgo sick-leave, overtime and holiday pay in order to save some jobs.
Callwood's projection for Friday was that it, too, would be "touch and go." He said he had anticipated personnel problems as a result of the layoffs but credited the drivers with being "professionals dedicated to their jobs."
He said he expects that the drivers will rally in the next few days because they "love their jobs and have a commitment to the community." He added, "It's my gut feeling that in a few days we will be over these growing pains and get adjusted to the new schedule."
Danet said only one cruise ship is scheduled to be at the WICO dock on Friday, and none again on Saturday.
Safari bus driver Burnett Smith had a word of advice for Vitran Thursday, as he awaited passengers at the main bus stop on the University of the Virgin Islands campus. "They should run it as a private company," he said. "If they had to sell service to survive, they'd do it."
