Nowhere to Put Your Bags on Public Transit Buses Serving the Vancouver International Airport
By Richard Eriksson on August 30, 2006 - 6:59pm
This year, I've been travelling to Toronto often, to visit my girlfriend, and I noticed what Hirosan pointed out with his three photos on Flickr: when going from (or even to) the airport on public transit you don't have anywhere to put your bags. From the airport, the regular bus does not have any space for baggage, nor does the 98 B-line as you can see in an overhead shot. This is in contrast to the much more expensive Airporter (which does not stop between downtown and the airport) and the express bus from downtown Vancouver to the Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal, which has shelves where people can put their suitcases and other heavy things they don't want clogging the aisles. I'll be interested to see how the Canada Line, which goes directly to the airport from downtown, handles this problem, as this will likely replace both the Airport-to-Airport Station bus as well as the Richmond-to-Vancouver express bus.
[Cross-posted to my personal weblog.]
Crush hour is never a fun time on the transit system. It's a struggle sometimes to enter/leave through the doors even without luggage. After a long flight and being jet-lagged makes things worse.
I remember arriving in Gatwick airport in England carrying heavy baggage. They have an express train leaving every 15 minutes running non-stop to a subway station. The express train was simple to load and unload from. At the subway station though it was a struggle as it was an old one requiring going up and down many stairs. I paid a pan-handler to help carry my bags for part of the way as they were heavy and I was jet-lagged and tired and still had further to travel that day.
it would be really dumb if the Canada line doesn't have luggage racks, but yeah the buses and normal SkyTrain will never have luggage racks unfortunately!
Roland Tanglao
VanEats
Bryght
Just like to add that the YVR Airporter bus is really unrealiable. Last three times I tried to take it, the Airporter was 1) late, 2) didn't show up at all meaning I had to take a very expensive taxi and 3) only took me a couple of stops before the driver stopped the bus for his dinner break, so that I almost missed my flight. Who needs this kind of stress?
Don't waste your time and money on the YVR Airporter!