LAST WEEK'S ANNOUNCEMENT by Greyhound Canada that it plans to end local services in Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario should serve as a wake-up call to federal politicians.

For reasons we've never understood and no doubt are not valid in today's circumstances, the politicians of the day established Via Rail Canada as a shadowy successor to the rail passenger services previously offered by our national railways.

In the knowledge that rail passenger services would seldom, if ever, be profitable beyond the busy Windsor- Montreal corridor, Via's management has systematically reduced or eliminated all other services and made absolutely no attempt to come up with innovative means of serving the rest of the country.

Meanwhile, Greyhound Canada went about securing a virtual monopoly of intercity bus service across Canada. Locally, it purchased both Gray Coach Lines (a subsidiary of the Toronto Transit Commission) and its lone competitor, Penetang Midland Coach Lines, raised fares rather spectacularly and reduced service to the point where today only one bus passes through Dufferin, leaving Owen Sound at 10:30 a.m. and arriving in downtown Toronto shortly after 2 p.m., then starting its return trip at about 6 p.m.

As for fares, the non-refundable "bargain" ticket costs $21.75 to and from Orangeville and $23.30 for an adult going to or from Shelburne.

In comparison, the current GO Transit fare between Orangeville and Toronto's Union Station is $9.40 for adults and half that for students and seniors.

Assuming, reasonably, that the local Greyhound fares are typical of those elsewhere in Canada, it's passing strange that after gobbling up all its competition, the Canadian subsidiary of Dallas-based Greyhound Lines Inc. now thinks it deserves multi-milliondollar subsidies in return for continuing to serve small-town Canada.

As we see it, the appropriate response of the federal government would be to give Via Rail essentially the same role role the Ontario government gave GO Transit, a mandate to provide rail service in the Greater Toronto Area where it's warranted, complemented by bus service where it isn't.

It will surely strike many readers as little short of outrageous that if Greyhound carries out its plan, cities like Thunder Bay and Kenora, as well as the towns and villages between them, will have no intercity public transportation of any sort except by air.

If indeed we're to have another federal election this fall, it will be interesting to see whether any of the three national parties will include in their platforms a commitment to overhaul Via Rail, requiring it to provide, directly or indirectly, rail or bus transportation to every Canadian community that's either currently served by Greyhound (or another line) or once had rail passenger service.

With such a mandate, Via would be encouraged to examine the best means of providing such services. In this part of the country it would be fairly obvious that one option would be collaboration with GO Transit, so that places like Peterborough, Collingwood and Goderich that still have a railway close at hand would once more have the option of rail passenger service and smaller centres would have connecting bus services.

Obviously, cost would be a major consideration, and the new mandate for Via should stress the need for innovative means of providing good service at minimal cost.

In terms of service, Via should be encouraged to look at economical means of providing good service to smaller communities.

As we see it, the best option available would be self-propelled passenger coaches similar to the "dayliners" that once provided daily service between Toronto and Owen Sound and dozens of other CPR branch lines across the country and even today are used between Sudbury and White River and on Vancouver Island.

Although those rail diesel cars are now more than 50 years old, Bombardier is producing 21st-Century versions of them for European railways.

As for bus services, the most costeffective means of providing them would undoubtedly be by having Via contract them out to independent operators, where possible having them connect with the revived rail passenger services.

In the interim, it would be interesting to see what would happen if Via purchased a dozen or so refurbished dayliners to test the attractiveness of relatively high-speed rail service using them on existing tracks out of Orangeville, Goderich, Collingwood and Peterborough, as well as on the CP Rail main line that once carried passengers from Vancouver to Toronto and Montreal via Calgary, Regina and Thunder Bay, all of which no longer have rail passenger service.

Even then, the rail passenger service would be far short of that once offered Canadians and still available to Europeans.