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Post by Cascadian Transport on Aug 11, 2015 12:41:10 GMT -8
A 4th vessel would be interesting to see where it will go to. I have been wondering that, too. There are 4 routes it could go to. Below I have listed each route it could end up at and the odds of it going to each: San Juan Islands-40% Mukilteo-Clinton-40% Seattle-Bremerton-15% Fauntleroy-Vashon-Southworth-5%
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Post by Kahloke on Aug 11, 2015 13:32:01 GMT -8
A 4th vessel would be interesting to see where it will go to. I have been wondering that, too. There are 4 routes it could go to. Below I have listed each route it could end up at and the odds of it going to each: San Juan Islands-40% Mukilteo-Clinton-40% Seattle-Bremerton-15% Fauntleroy-Vashon-Southworth-5% I would say there is 0 chance it will end up at F-V-S - much too large of a vessel for that route. My bet would be San Juans or Mukilteo. If it went to Mukilteo, it's possible that the Mukilteo terminal re-build will be completed by the time it enters service, so that would help with maintaining the current dwell time. Clinton should also get passenger overhead loading to maximize the benefit, and minimize the dwell time, of having 2 Olympic Class vessels on that route. Still, having 2 144's there makes sense to me given the increasing amounts of traffic on South Whidbey. That would shift Kittitas to F-V-S, and put Kitsap into relief status. Bremerton would continue to operate with a Super and Chimacum, and the San Juans would continue to operate with 2 Supers and Samish. If the 4th Olympic went to Anacortes, that would put 1 Super, Samish, and the new ferry up there. Mukilteo-Clinton would carry on with Kittitas and Tokitae, and Bremerton would still have Chimacum and a Super. This scenario would reduce the use of the Supers, which, as we know, are getting a bit long in the tooth, and suffering from increasing problems as they age, but it doesn't address the growing traffic volumes on the Mukilteo-Clinton route, and it leaves no smaller vessel in reserve, unless they get a waiver and extend the service life of Tillikum. There are pros and cons for both scenarios. Personally, I think the 4th vessel should go to Mukilteo, at least in the summers, to keep traffic moving there, especially since that route would not be a good candidate for a reservation system due to the frequency of sailings.
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Post by Blue Bus Fan on Aug 11, 2015 14:43:24 GMT -8
I think it will end up at Mukilteo / Clinton because it needs the most. Does the long range plan call for the route to get two Olympic Class by 2025?
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Post by Low Light Mike on Aug 11, 2015 15:00:19 GMT -8
One of the new ships will need to be SOLAS certified, because Elwha isn't likely going to last much longer (same as her super sisters). So it makes sense to get a ship SOLAS'd at the outset during construction, rather than after the fact.
WSF seems to do well with 2 SOLAS ships, Chelan and Elwha. This gives them flexibility for ship movement both for emergencies and for seasonal shufflings.
You'd never see a SOLAS Olympic at Sidney during the summer season, because the ship's capacity is more valuable for a domestic route during peak times. But when Chelan gets shuffled or refitted in off-seasons, then a SOLAS Olympic would be required for Sidney-Anacortes route, much the same as Elwha does shoulder-service at Sidney now.
So Sidney SOLAS is an issue that can't be ignored when deciding where to place the new ships.
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Post by Political Incorrectness on Aug 11, 2015 15:06:28 GMT -8
One of the new ships will need to be SOLAS certified, because Elwha isn't going to last much longer (same as her super sisters). So it makes sense to get a ship SOLAS'd at the outset during construction, rather than after the fact. WSF seems to do well with 2 SOLAS ships, Chelan and Elwha. This gives them flexibility for ship movement both for emergencies and for seasonal shufflings. You'd never see a SOLAS Olympic at Sidney during the summer season, because the ship's capacity is more valuable for a domestic route during peak times. But when Chelan gets shuffled or refitted in off-seasons, then a SOLAS Olympic would be required for Sidney-Anacortes route, much the same as Elwha does should-service at Sidney now. So Sidney SOLAS is an issue that can't be ignored when deciding where to place the new ships. Well the Chelan would have to be scheduled in drydock during the 12 weeks the Sidney run does not operate. There was a point in time where Sidney was considered to be axed because BC Ferries took it over and WSF signed a long lease but at the same time it is nice to have that run, except all the facilities at least at Anacortes are old and dated. When it comes to operational costs, it will be interesting to see if Sidney is worth keeping or not. In summer, it does quite well but my thought was always to do a Port Townsend Keystone to the route and make it a shoulder season only route, 2nd half of spring through the 1st half of fall operate the route. Given the reservation system for the San Juans, it makes me wonder how much a benefit it would be to have another vessel for the islands and could the islands handle having a 4th Anacortes-San Juan Islands vessel.
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Post by chokai on Aug 11, 2015 22:23:45 GMT -8
I suspect a 4th Olympic would pull duty on the San Juan's or Seattle<->Bremerton as needed depending on the season. Likely spending the summer in the Islands and the winter at Bremerton. That would allow them to pull a Super or Olympic out of out for maintenance as needed while maintaining capacity. The Olympics might be new and shiny but will still need TLC every year or so. Basically she'll take on the role (or allow a super to) that the Kitsap and occasionally the Kaleetan and Chelan fill today depending on the season but usually can only do with a capacity cut.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 12, 2015 4:07:16 GMT -8
The fourth vessel would allow the retirement of all three Evergreen boats, would it not? This would give them a spare vessel to work with, if they don't retire any Supers in the context of this project.
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Post by Low Light Mike on Aug 12, 2015 6:27:53 GMT -8
The fourth vessel would allow the retirement of all three Evergreen boats, would it not? This would give them a spare vessel to work with, if they don't retire any Supers in the context of this project. I think that some of the Supers might retire themselves, sooner than thought. I don't think the planning can assume there will be 4 working Supers, when WSF is dealing with 4 old ships that have some significant issues. So I don't think there will be a planned and orderly style of vessel retirement. When Elwha decides that she's really finished, she'll be finished. (just a top-heavy memory)
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lifc
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Post by lifc on Aug 17, 2015 13:04:55 GMT -8
Does anyone have any photos of the progress of the Chimacum? I think the 4th one ought to be stretched by a couple of car lengths and then used on Seattle/Bremerton.
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Post by Cascadian Transport on Aug 17, 2015 14:52:02 GMT -8
I think the 4th one ought to be stretched by a couple of car lengths and then used on Seattle/Bremerton. I think that Oly 4 and all Olympics built after it should be 20 feet longer (Thus bumping vehicle capacity to 155) and have the crew quarters converted into an upper cabin. The crew quarters could be relocated to elsewhere on the ship; perhaps within a new enclosed area between the stacks. My two cents.
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Post by hergfest on Aug 17, 2015 23:20:41 GMT -8
The Olympics won't be redesigned at this point, it would add too much cost.
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lifc
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Post by lifc on Aug 18, 2015 11:10:44 GMT -8
The extension is not a redesign, the boat is designed to be extended. The added costs would be well spent, the WSF needs the increased capacity today, the WSF is experiencing a double digit growth in passages, this year.
It would also be a good test to see if the extension is viable, it it is, further development could be done. With these vessels, the WSF has taken a nice measured approach to the new design, and it has worked out. If they hadn't they could have stopped at two and did something else. When compared to the KDT's where three were authorized before the first went into service, this is a great approach. The KDT's are the perfect example of what not to do, they do absolutely nothing well, these 144's seem to be working pretty well.
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Post by Kahloke on Aug 18, 2015 13:30:11 GMT -8
The extension is not a redesign, the boat is designed to be extended. The added costs would be well spent, the WSF needs the increased capacity today, the WSF is experiencing a double digit growth in passages, this year. It would also be a good test to see if the extension is viable, it it is, further development could be done. With these vessels, the WSF has taken a nice measured approach to the new design, and it has worked out. If they hadn't they could have stopped at two and did something else. When compared to the KDT's where three were authorized before the first went into service, this is a great approach. The KDT's are the perfect example of what not to do, they do absolutely nothing well, these 144's seem to be working pretty well. Personally, I believe an extension would suit the Olympic Class vessels well. Stretch it out one car length (18-20ft), and that nets you 11 additional car spaces for a total of 155. Stretch it out 2 car lengths (36-40ft) and you would get 22 additional car spaces for a total of 166. I find the current design to be a little short based on the proportions of the superstructure. A lengthening of the design would fix much of the proportion issues, however, I'm not sure what it would do to the wake design. That said, I think Hergfest is correct in that we will not see a modification to the design until Flight 2 of the newbuild program. If they build a 4th vessel now, expect it to be identical to the first three.
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Post by chokai on Aug 18, 2015 19:56:49 GMT -8
With the 4th Olympic now approved we likely aren't going to see Flight II until the late 2020's.
I would expect only minor changes including partial enclosure of the sundecks and appropriate propulsion system updates (likely an up-power) in any Flight II boats. Why? Because planning for the Walla Walla and Spokane will need to start in the late 2020's to complete by the early 2030's. If you needed to upsize an Olympic by any appreciable amount above say the 160 car range, I'd just pull the trigger on building additional jumbo sized ferries starting in 2026 or so with one finishing every two to three years. A few additional jumbo sized vessels that were low wake could be handy at Bremerton in addition to Edmonds/Kingston. They have little use at Mukilteo/Clinton or the Triangle with the low dwell times there permitted by the service patterns, and would likely not be popular in the Islands.
We all know that WSF has made it clear they are not interested in big bumps to car capacity and will be focusing on passenger capacity going forward, just see the focus on multimodal terminals. But if we did make a change lets hope it doesn't mess up those lines or require a massive up-power, one area where this class has really delivered is low wake, you can barely see it when riding on Tokitae and it barely moves my 18' Hewescraft when I pass over it.
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lifc
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Post by lifc on Aug 29, 2015 8:47:20 GMT -8
From my contact with the WSF, the idea of concentrating on increasing passenger capacity and not expanding car capacity is no longer a goal. That peaked with the acquisition with the KDT class. which are now overwhelmed with vehicle traffic, while never coming close to passenger capacity. In fact the whole system is now overwhelmed with excess vehicle traffic with double digit increases on most routes. This attempt of social engineering by several NGO groups has proven to have been a total failure in real life. Of late the vehicle traffic has greatly outpaced the walk-on passenger load increase. The system will have to increase it's vehicle carry capacity, the users have spoken.
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Neil
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Post by Neil on Aug 29, 2015 10:17:12 GMT -8
From my contact with the WSF, the idea of concentrating on increasing passenger capacity and not expanding car capacity is no longer a goal. That peaked with the acquisition with the KDT class. which are now overwhelmed with vehicle traffic, while never coming close to passenger capacity. In fact the whole system is now overwhelmed with excess vehicle traffic with double digit increases on most routes. This attempt of social engineering by several NGO groups has proven to have been a total failure in real life. Of late the vehicle traffic has greatly outpaced the walk-on passenger load increase. The system will have to increase it's vehicle carry capacity, the users have spoken. Actual traffic statistics don't confirm your view. 2014 saw a 1.3% increase in vehicle traffic system wide, and a 4.8% increase in foot passengers. The second quarter of 2015 saw an increase of 3.3% in vehicles and 4.8% in foot passengers. On no route in either set of figures was there a double digit increase in vehicles.
So, foot passenger traffic growth is indeed outpacing vehicle traffic... probably as a result of those evil social engineering NGOs deluding people into believing they can actually travel without a car.
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Post by suburbanite on Sept 3, 2015 11:45:53 GMT -8
It is interesting to note that this increase in system use has come despite capacity reductions on several popular summer routes due to maintenance needs of Jumbo MK IIs and the ever more fragile Supers. Having two new 144 car Olympics have helped keep service reductions from becoming service meltdowns. When 87 and 90 car vessels are replacing 124, 144 or 188 car vessels and yet total traffic is still increasing it confirms what many system users already know. Peak time sailings are full and customers are traveling on other sailings. Of course that only applies to vehicle customers and their passengers. Walk ons continue to benefit from an excess of passenger capacity on all but a few sailings per year. Neither NGOs or even the government organizations intent on impeding vehicle traffic can change the fact that cars and trucks remain the most efficient and cost effective way to move people and goods from where they are to where we would like them to be. Hopefully WSF and the legislature can deal with the reality that as soon as the 4th 144 car Olympic is delivered in 2018 they had better be ready to buy the next four large ferries to replace the then 50+ year old supers. Then we can start a Jumbo MK III discussion.
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Post by Barnacle on Sept 3, 2015 14:48:26 GMT -8
Hopefully WSF and the legislature can deal with the reality that as soon as the 4th 144 car Olympic is delivered in 2018 they had better be ready to buy the next four large ferries to replace the then 50+ year old supers. Then we can start a Jumbo MK III discussion. I was about to state that we don't need JM3s, but I re-read your post and realized the discussion you propose comes after the second flight of 144s, by which time... yes. We'll need to be looking at replacements for the Spokane and Walla Walla. And by that time, me too.
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lifc
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Post by lifc on Sept 8, 2015 10:11:35 GMT -8
I spoke again to my contact in the WSF office about the increase in traffic. He told me that his estimate of the huge increases in car traffic were from the events of mid-late August. He said most routes, especially the tourist routes were absolutely inundated with Car traffic, the system was not able to keep up on even a remotely reasonably timely basis. Passenger traffic also increased. While it is clear that more people are purposely walking on, he thinks walk-on increases were considerably larger than they would be if people would have been able to get their vehicles on, the boats did have the extra walk-on capacity.
So along with all the other problems, the WSF needs to ramp up the vehicle capacity.
I predict the WSF is not going to surplus the E State boats anytime soon, more likely the Olympics will become replacements for the Supers, perhaps both these classes will be slowly retired concurrently as new boats become available.
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Post by hergfest on Sept 13, 2015 20:44:27 GMT -8
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FNS
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Post by FNS on Sept 24, 2015 21:27:51 GMT -8
Progress is being made on the upper works of the new MV CHIMACUM. Photo taken Saturday, September 19, 2015.
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Post by SS San Mateo on Nov 6, 2015 8:28:40 GMT -8
This article (editorial about the unknown future of the ferries) from this weeks Vashon Beachcomber had this bit of info: No specifics were given as to why the dock can't handle the boats.
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Post by Kahloke on Nov 6, 2015 9:11:13 GMT -8
This article (editorial about the unknown future of the ferries) from this weeks Vashon Beachcomber had this bit of info: No specifics were given as to why the dock can't handle the boats. I can't imagine it would be a physical constraint of the wing walls. If an Olympic-class vessel can land at Shaw, surely any of the F-V-S slips can accommodate it. The issues I see with deploying an Olympic to F-V-S have more to do with vehicle capacity constraints at the docks, and more than that, the effect a larger vessel would have on the schedule regarding loading and unloading times. F-V-S will benefit from the new-build program by gaining more Issaquah-class vessels when the new boats enter service at Bremerton, Mukilteo, or Anacortes. Eventually, I think we will see 3 Issaquah-124's on the triangle route. Granted, the schedule will have to be re-written again to offset the capacity gains, but a bump in capacity is still a good thing.
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Post by Barnacle on Nov 7, 2015 9:19:23 GMT -8
This article (editorial about the unknown future of the ferries) from this weeks Vashon Beachcomber had this bit of info: No specifics were given as to why the dock can't handle the boats. I can't imagine it would be a physical constraint of the wing walls. If an Olympic-class vessel can land at Shaw, surely any of the F-V-S slips can accommodate it. The issues I see with deploying an Olympic to F-V-S have more to do with vehicle capacity constraints at the docks, and more than that, the effect a larger vessel would have on the schedule regarding loading and unloading times. F-V-S will benefit from the new-build program by gaining more Issaquah-class vessels when the new boats enter service at Bremerton, Mukilteo, or Anacortes. Eventually, I think we will see 3 Issaquah-124's on the triangle route. Granted, the schedule will have to be re-written again to offset the capacity gains, but a bump in capacity is still a good thing. An uneducated guess says that Fauntleroy would be the loudest about the increase in vehicle traffic, especially on Fauntleroy Way. The West Seattleites (at this point, all of whom have arrived--by birth or relocation--after the ferry dock) have wanted the dock out of there for YEARS.
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Post by Olympic Ferries on Nov 8, 2015 14:56:50 GMT -8
I have been wondering that, too. There are 4 routes it could go to. Below I have listed each route it could end up at and the odds of it going to each: San Juan Islands-40% Mukilteo-Clinton-40% Seattle-Bremerton-15% Fauntleroy-Vashon-Southworth-5% I would say there is 0 chance it will end up at F-V-S - much too large of a vessel for that route. My bet would be San Juans or Mukilteo. If it went to Mukilteo, it's possible that the Mukilteo terminal re-build will be completed by the time it enters service, so that would help with maintaining the current dwell time. Clinton should also get passenger overhead loading to maximize the benefit, and minimize the dwell time, of having 2 Olympic Class vessels on that route. Still, having 2 144's there makes sense to me given the increasing amounts of traffic on South Whidbey. That would shift Kittitas to F-V-S, and put Kitsap into relief status. Bremerton would continue to operate with a Super and Chimacum, and the San Juans would continue to operate with 2 Supers and Samish. If the 4th Olympic went to Anacortes, that would put 1 Super, Samish, and the new ferry up there. Mukilteo-Clinton would carry on with Kittitas and Tokitae, and Bremerton would still have Chimacum and a Super. This scenario would reduce the use of the Supers, which, as we know, are getting a bit long in the tooth, and suffering from increasing problems as they age, but it doesn't address the growing traffic volumes on the Mukilteo-Clinton route, and it leaves no smaller vessel in reserve, unless they get a waiver and extend the service life of Tillikum. There are pros and cons for both scenarios. Personally, I think the 4th vessel should go to Mukilteo, at least in the summers, to keep traffic moving there, especially since that route would not be a good candidate for a reservation system due to the frequency of sailings. I agree with Kahloke on this. It is a 1/3 chance for SJI, Mukilteo or Bremerton. The boat just would be too empty at Vashon.
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