It was the end of an era at the North Battleford bus depot Wednesday night.
The depot hosted an STC bus for the final time as it picked up passengers for the final leg of its route to Meadow Lake.
The bus arrived from Saskatoon at 7:10 p.m., and departed at 7:30 p.m., right on schedule.
After it arrived in Meadow Lake, the bus was to stay overnight and then be driven back to the garage the following day.
The night marked the end of over 70 years of service for the provincial Crown corporation, a high-profile casualty of provincial budget cuts in March.
There had been an attempt by STC workers to challenge the closedown in court, however a judge ruled against them the week before.
There was relatively little fanfare at the North Battleford depot about the final STC bus departure, with only a handful of passengers in attendance at the depot and on the bus.
There were no demonstrators seen outside the depot, unlike other bus terminals in the province where the organization Stop the Cuts had scheduled rallies. About 100 people had attended a protest rally at the bus depot in Saskatoon earlier in the day.
In North Battleford, a noon-hour rally had been held days earlier outside MLA Herb Cox’s office on May 12, which was well attended by STC supporters.
As for the North Battleford depot, it will stay open to handle Greyhound arrivals and departures, but there have been layoffs at the location.
There is no word yet of any replacement to the STC routes. One private company out of Saskatoon, Tiger Courier, has offered to pick up many of the courier routes including North Battleford.
