Calgary Transit: Bus Fires Spark Service Crisis

CALGARY — One bus goes up in flames, and suddenly 19 of its siblings are benched. That's the math Calgary Transit is working with after yanking nearly two dozen shuttle buses off the streets on December 23, 2025, following a December 12 fire on Nose Hill Drive N.W. that sent a driver to the hospital and left commuters staring down potential service cuts.

The bus fire wasn't just spectacular—it was a wake-up call. The driver, alone on board, grabbed an onboard extinguisher and tried to fight back before flames swallowed the vehicle whole. Non-life-threatening injuries, sure. But the Calgary Fire Department is still picking through the wreckage, and Calgary Transit Director Sharon Fleming wasn't waiting around for answers. All buses in that model series? Gone. Precautionary doesn't begin to cover it.

The Money Problem Nobody Wants to Talk About

Here's the kicker: Calgary Transit was already bleeding. During November 2025 budget talks, Fleming dropped a bomb—$45 million short of what's needed to buy enough new buses to hit the city's own RouteAhead service targets. The 2026 capital budget sits at $306 million, but when you're pulling buses out of rotation faster than you can replace them, that number starts looking thin.

Deploying replacement shuttles costs real money. Adjusting schedules to keep the system from collapsing costs real money. And every commuter stuck waiting an extra 20 minutes in January cold? That's a political cost the city can't afford to ignore.

The Union Isn't Buying It

Amalgamated Transit Union Local 583 President Mike Mahar has been beating the safety drum for months, and he's got receipts. A violent assault on a driver in May 2025 turned operator safety from a talking point into a full-blown crisis. Now equipment's catching fire, and the union's asking the question everyone's thinking: How bad does it have to get?

Councillor Andre Chabot, who chairs the Infrastructure and Planning Committee overseeing Calgary Transit, hasn't blinked yet. But with buses burning, budgets hemorrhaging, and the union watching every move, the clock's ticking.

The investigation continues. The buses stay parked. And Calgary commuters are left wondering if the ride home just got a lot longer.