Commuters Brace for Trip Home After Snowfall Snarls Traffic, Closes Schools

By THE CANADIAN PRESS

VANCOUVER – A rare snowfall may create a winter wonderland for people on the West Coast but the snow that blanketed Metro Vancouver on Tuesday also created commuter chaos.

In and around Vancouver up to four centimetres of snow blanketed the area. Further out towards the Fraser Valley, up to 25 centimetres fell. It backed up morning traffic for hours, with fender benders littering the roadways.

Several vehicles, including a transit bus, were involved in a crash on Highway 1 and another transit bus jack-knifed across a main Vancouver thoroughfare, blocking traffic. There were no injuries reported.

Kate Coinner, who usually takes the SkyTrain, said it took her almost two hours to get to work when the trip usually lasts 30 minutes.

“It was pretty bad,” she said of the long wait with hundreds of other commuters at a SkyTrain station.

“They had us all kind of herded in there so even if you wanted to leave you were kind of trapped in there, so it was really not pleasant.”

Coinner eventually escaped and took the bus to work after calling her employer to say she’d be late.

The snow forced the closure of schools in Mission, Maple Ridge, North and West Vancouver and cancelled classes at Simon Fraser University, the B.C. Institute of Technology and several colleges.

But the roads were the focus of trouble as drivers prepared for the commute home, many leaving the office early to avoid the snow flurries Environment Canada was calling for later in the day.

More people took public transit to the office to avoid slipping and sliding around in their vehicles, especially on unplowed side streets but transit officials were warning commuters to give themselves plenty of time to get home.

“People should know now that they have to leave earlier so there won’t be quite the frenzy as it was (this morning),” said Peter Louwe, spokesman for TransLink, the regional public transit operator.

“The West Coast is unique in that a lot of people don’t bother with snow tires, don’t bother winterizing their car and they figure, ‘If it snows I’ll park it,”‘ he said.

“People just have to know that it’s winter out here, at least for another day or so. So slow down, take more time, drive slower and give more time if you’re going to the bus or the SkyTrain because it’s going to be busier.”

Tuesday morning’s traffic woes were complicated by the derailment of a CP Rail grain train on tracks in suburban Burnaby along Burrard Inlet just east of the Ironworkers’ Memorial Bridge.

CP spokeswoman Breanne Feigel said no one was hurt in the 2 a.m. incident and the two-car derailment caused no environmental damage, but it blocked tracks shared by the West Coast Express commuter rail service.

TransLink spokesman Drew Snider said that meant passengers heading to Vancouver from the Fraser Valley had to get off in Coquitlam and transfer to buses for a trip to the nearest SkyTrain station in New Westminster.

From there, the roughly 1,000 passengers from each of the five trains had to squeeze onto SkyTrain cars already filled to capacity by commuters who had left their vehicles at home in favour of transit.

“We’ve been reminding people that they need to dress warmly, expect delays, be patient and expect there is going to be a lot of company on those transit systems,” Snider said.

Snowfall warnings remained in effect Tuesday for the Queen Charlotte Islands and most of Vancouver Island, as well as the Sunshine Coast, Metro Vancouver, Fraser Valley and Central Okanagan.

As much as 15 centimetres of snow was expected to fall in some areas before the system turned to rain.