NATIONAL STORIES
Vancouver’s Last Bike Couriers Race to Survive the Digital Age
By David Chan | The Current
Once a familiar sight in downtown Vancouver, bicycle couriers are now an increasingly rare part of the city’s working life. In 1998, more than 400 licensed messengers crisscrossed Vancouver carrying cheques, legal filings and urgent business documents. Today, city records show that only 10 licensed bike couriers remain.
The dramatic decline reflects how completely technology has changed office work. Fax machines first reduced the need for hand-delivered documents. Email, electronic transfers, digital signatures and app-based delivery services accelerated the shift. An industry built around moving paper quickly through crowded streets suddenly found that much of the paper no longer needed to move at all.
Yet the bicycle courier has not disappeared.
Phantom Couriers is among a small group of Vancouver businesses keeping the profession alive. they started promoting their services by slipping homemade flyers under downtown office doors. At its peak, Phantom employed more than 30 couriers. Today, it has just one full-time bicycle messenger. What remains valuable is not nostalgia. It is speed, reliability and trust.
Law firms, banks and other professional offices still rely on physical cheques, certified documents and court filings that must arrive before firm deadlines. In Vancouver’s dense downtown core, a skilled cyclist can often move more quickly than a car. Couriers also become familiar faces to receptionists, tellers and mailroom staff, building relationships that delivery platforms cannot easily reproduce.
An average workday demonstrates how demanding that service can be. Couriers can travel 28 kilometres and spent hours waiting in banks. A busy day can involve as many as 75 stops and roughly 50 kilometres of riding. Deliveries may carry 60-minute or 30-minute deadlines, forcing couriers to understand traffic patterns, office towers, elevators and alleyways with remarkable precision.
The job also carries real risk. Couriers navigate buses, taxis, distracted drivers, poor weather and occasional road rage. Veteran messengers describe years of physical wear, including knee and ligament injuries. The work may look liberating from an office window, but it demands endurance, concentration and constant judgment.
WorkBC says couriers earn an average of $43,990 annually in British Columbia, while hourly wages range from minimum wage to $32.
Technology, once responsible for shrinking the industry, has also become part of its rescue. Phantom uses artificial intelligence to help sort email, create marketing materials and maintain business software. Its dispatch system uses an algorithm to prioritize deliveries, while human dispatchers continue matching urgent jobs with available couriers.
That combination reveals a larger lesson for small businesses. Survival rarely comes from defending the old way of doing things. It comes from understanding what customers still value and using new tools to deliver it better.
Vancouver’s bicycle couriers may never again number in the hundreds. Their future will depend on a narrow but important need for urgency, accountability and human trust. As long as documents still have to cross downtown before a bank or courthouse closes, a messenger on two wheels may remain the fastest answer in the city.
NATIONAL STORIES
Search Continues After Ontario-Based Medical Flight Vanishes Near Massachusetts Coast
U.S. Coast Guard crews are searching near Nantucket for a missing Latitude Air Ambulance jet carrying four Canadians and two passengers from Bermuda.
Emergency Search Underway Off Nantucket
Air and ground search teams are scanning waters approximately 150 kilometres southeast of Boston after a medical transport aircraft vanished early Saturday morning. Contact with the Gulfstream G100 jet was lost around 1:30 a.m. as it made its approach toward Boston from Bermuda, prompting a response from the U.S. Coast Guard following notification by the Federal Aviation Administration.
Flight Carrying Crew and Patients
The aircraft is operated by Hamilton-based Latitude Air Ambulance. According to Clarence Togeretz, operations manager for the company, six individuals were aboard the flight. The crew consists of two Canadian pilots and two Canadian medical staff members. They were transporting two Bermuda nationals, identified as a patient and a family member.
Response and Ongoing Inquiries
Togeretz confirmed that the company contacted American authorities after the plane failed to land on the tarmac as scheduled. He noted that this marks the first instance where the operator has lost contact with one of its aircraft, adding that the team is holding onto optimism while praying for a safe resolution. Latitude Air Ambulance has reached out to Transport Canada regarding the incident. Meanwhile, provincial air ambulance provider Ornge expressed support via social media, stating it hopes the aircraft and everyone on board are located safely and quickly.
NATIONAL STORIES
Why Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre Questions Mark Carney’s New Pipeline Stance
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre criticizes Mark Carney’s pipeline proposal, calling him an illusion and questioning his shift on oil and gas.
Poilievre Dismisses Carney’s Fast-Track Pipeline Proposal
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has expressed strong skepticism regarding Mark Carney, describing him as an “illusion” ahead of an upcoming major announcement. Poilievre questioned Carney’s recent backing of a proposal to fast-track and construct a West Coast pipeline project.
Contrasting Past Record with Recent Statements
Poilievre highlighted Carney’s history over the past decade, pointing out that the former banker worked to defund oil and gas, established an alliance aimed at shutting down the sector, opposed a Pacific pipeline, and advocated for higher carbon taxes.
“I don’t know how you can go in three years from believing oil and gas is going to end the world to believing you support oil and gas,” Poilievre stated. “I guess miracles are possible. He claims to have changed his mind but he hasn’t really changed the results. There’s been a lot of talk.”
Comparisons to Foreign Project Delivery
In assessing the situation, the Conservative leader observed that large-scale infrastructure projects are completed rapidly in nations like Germany and the United States.
NATIONAL STORIES
Michael J. Fox Earns Canada’s Highest Civilian Distinction for Parkinson’s Work
Michael J. Fox was elevated to companion of the Order of Canada alongside 50 other honourees, including UBC engineering professor Yusuf Altintas.
National Honours Presented at Rideau Hall
During an investiture ceremony on Friday morning at Rideau Hall, Gov. Gen. Louise Arbour formally elevated celebrated actor and advocate Michael J. Fox to the companion level of the Order of Canada, drawing a standing ovation from attendees. Rideau Hall cited his unflinching honesty and powerful global advocacy concerning Parkinson’s disease for the elevation. Fox, who publicly disclosed his diagnosis in 1998, has helped generate $2.5 billion for research into the progressive nervous system disorder, which causes tremors, slowness, stiffness, memory difficulties, and depression.
Distinguished Inductees Recognized Across Fields
A total of 51 individuals joined or advanced within the Order of Canada during the Friday event. Arbour praised the group in French for directing their skills, influence, and effort toward the public good rather than personal gain alone, noting that Fox serves as a shining example of using courage, imagination, and determination to foster lasting progress.
The newly honoured members and officers include noteworthy figures across various disciplines. University of British Columbia mechanical engineering professor Yusuf Altintas was inducted as an officer alongside McGill University professor Nada Jabado, who was recognized for her contributions to pediatric neuro-oncology. Former Bank of Canada governor Stephen Poloz became an officer for his efforts supporting international trade and economic stability. Sculptor Ruth Elsie Abernethy entered as a member for her worldwide bronze statues exploring heritage, gender, and nation-building, while Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Susanne Craig was named a member for her impactful reporting across major American and Canadian news outlets.
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