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Post by gordon on Sept 19, 2012 12:47:23 GMT -8
The northern routes are the most heavily subsbidzed routes in the system, so why does b.c Ferries continue to run overlapping service through the Inside Passsage in May & September when meither vessel is likely close to 50%full
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Post by Deleted on Sept 19, 2012 13:10:13 GMT -8
I agree. In the shoulder season, we have two vessels (essentially three) all doing the same route. It happens about a week or two every May & September.
We have: -The Chilliwack doing her usual summer routine stopping at every village. -The NorAd starting her Winter routine (Prince Rupert-Small Villages-Port Hardy and Prince Rupert-Skidegate). -The NorEx doing her summer routine (PH-PR direct) So basically, we have 2 ships serving every mentioned port, except Skidegate. I wonder if cuts could be made that would save money? Or is this a scheduling issue...
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 19:42:09 GMT -8
Why doesn't BC Ferries close some terminal like Departure Bay and move route 2 to Duke Point which will reduce the time to 1 hour and 25 min, have Duke point servicing both Nanaimo routes and close Long Harbour or Fulford Harbour and have one of them servicing route 4 and 9? By reducing two routes to one terminal will save money.
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Post by lmtengs on Oct 2, 2012 20:37:11 GMT -8
Why doesn't BC Ferries close some terminal like Departure Bay and move route 2 to Duke Point which will reduce the time to 1 hour and 25 min, have Duke point servicing both Nanaimo routes and close Long Harbour or Fulford Harbour and have one of them servicing route 4 and 9? By reducing two routes to one terminal will save money. It's been discussed multiple times, and many of us think the Departure Bay closure would be great; thing is, BC Ferries apparently doesn't think so... There's also the Nanaimo Harbour terminal that could be closed and relocated to Duke, but residents of Gabriola complain that if that happened, it would take too long to get to Nanaimo to do their shopping.
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Neil
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Post by Neil on Oct 2, 2012 21:44:04 GMT -8
There's also the Nanaimo Harbour terminal that could be closed and relocated to Duke, but residents of Gabriola complain that if that happened, it would take too long to get to Nanaimo to do their shopping. People from Gabriola also work in Nanaimo and have medical appointments there, to name just two other reasons why they want the existing connection. If we're looking to a time in the future where people don't travel absolutely everywhere by car, it makes no sense to move the Gabriola connection so far out of town, and away from existing transit and other services. If, say, Bowen Island was as close to Vancouver as Gabriola is to Nanaimo, it would be crazy not to have the ferry go right downtown, even if there was another larger terminal ten miles away.
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Post by WettCoast on Oct 2, 2012 22:14:29 GMT -8
I have some sympathy with those who say that Nanaimo, with three terminals, is over-served. The possible closure of one of the Nanaimo area terminals has recently been discussed on the Duke Point & Departure Bay terminal threads. It has been suggested by a former deputy highways minister (R. G. Harvey, see the Duke Point thread) that the construction of Duke Point was a "gross error". It has also been suggested that as much as $30 million in annual savings could be achieved if Duke Point was permanently closed. Some savings could be realized if a terminal was closed but it seems doubtful that they would be anywhere near that much.
BC Ferries has been ordered to find ways to save money. You can bet that they are looking hard at the 3-terminal situation in Nanaimo. Closing anyone of them could lead to significant pains for people living around the terminals, the travelling public and/or commercial freight movement.
If I had to make the choice (and the status quo is not an option) then I would sacrifice Duke Point.
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Neil
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Post by Neil on Oct 2, 2012 22:30:14 GMT -8
If I had to make the choice (and the status quo is not an option) then I would sacrifice Duke Point. Then, I guess we're assuming that Deborah Marshall misspoke when she said a few months back that the operational savings while the Duke Point terminal was closed for repairs were marginal.
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Mill Bay
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Post by Mill Bay on Oct 3, 2012 7:16:10 GMT -8
Why doesn't BC Ferries close some terminal like Departure Bay and move route 2 to Duke Point which will reduce the time to 1 hour and 25 min, have Duke point servicing both Nanaimo routes and close Long Harbour or Fulford Harbour and have one of them servicing route 4 and 9? By reducing two routes to one terminal will save money. How would closing Long Harbour or Fulford make sense? They are at opposite ends of the island, serve markedly different routes requiring starkly different services. The time and distance ships would be required to cover to merge two routes into one terminal would alone far outweigh any cost savings gained.
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Post by WettCoast on Oct 3, 2012 11:22:12 GMT -8
How would closing Long Harbour or Fulford make sense? They are at opposite ends of the island, serve markedly different routes requiring starkly different services. The time and distance ships would be required to cover to merge two routes into one terminal would alone far outweigh any cost savings gained. Several decades ago BC Ferries opted to close a terminal on Galiano Island. The rationale that you provide for not consolidating terminals on Salt Spring could have applied perfectly to the situation on Galiano. Nevertheless, BC Ferries closed Montague Harbour.
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Mill Bay
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Post by Mill Bay on Oct 3, 2012 15:24:15 GMT -8
I don't think Montague is a fair comparison with Long Harbour, and definitely not with Fulford. The traffic levels would never have been the same, and the current scheduling allows transfers from route 5 to route 9 that makes an extension of route 5 to Montague Harbour redundant. From Village Bay to Montague is not a significantly shorter route than to Sturdies Bay, and Montague Harbour is closer to Sturdies by land than Fulford is to Long Harbour. The only major factor in favour of Monague is that it is much more sheltered in rough weather than Sturdies Bay.
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Post by WettCoast on Oct 3, 2012 18:03:13 GMT -8
I don't think Montague is a fair comparison with Long Harbour, and definitely not with Fulford. The traffic levels would never have been the same, and the current scheduling allows transfers from route 5 to route 9 that makes an extension of route 5 to Montague Harbour redundant. From Village Bay to Montague is not a significantly shorter route than to Sturdies Bay, and Montague Harbour is closer to Sturdies by land than Fulford is to Long Harbour. The only major factor in favour of Monague is that it is much more sheltered in rough weather than Sturdies Bay. Could BC Ferries save a bit of money on Salt Spring by operating two terminals instead of three? Yes, probably they could. Would it be enough of a savings to offset the capital cost that would be required to make such a change possible? I don't know. I suspect that it might take quite a few years to come out ahead on that. What do I see as possibly feasible? Closing Long Harbour and moving route 9's base of operations to Fulford Harbour. That would probably require a second berth at Fulford & maybe expansion of the holding area. It would also mean lengthening of route 9 by 5 minutes, maybe 10. When Montegue Harbour was closed Swartz Bay based vessels required increased time & distance to access Galiano via Sturdies Bay. Furthermore, additional vessel transits were required through the already busy and congested waterway we call Active Pass. The closing of Montegue Harbour probably made little sense to ferry users back when it was done, but BC Ferries did it anyways. Might the 21st century edition of BC Ferries apply that same logic on Salt Spring? Time will tell.
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Post by Kahloke on Oct 3, 2012 18:11:10 GMT -8
What do I see as possibly feasible? Closing Long Harbour and moving route 9's base of operations to Fulford Harbour. That would probably require a second berth at Fulford & maybe expansion of the holding area. It would also mean lengthening of route 9 by 5 minutes, maybe 10. Or would they simply eliminate the SSI stop on Route 9, and have everyone funnel through Swartz Bay? That would require a larger vessel on Route 4, and I'm not sure Swartz Bay could absorb the extra through-fare traffic to and from SSI, nor the capacity of the vessels on Route 1, which would also be impacted. I'm not really favouring this idea, I'm just wondering if that's how it would play out.
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Post by Mike C on Oct 3, 2012 18:40:17 GMT -8
I don't think Montague is a fair comparison with Long Harbour, and definitely not with Fulford. The traffic levels would never have been the same, and the current scheduling allows transfers from route 5 to route 9 that makes an extension of route 5 to Montague Harbour redundant. From Village Bay to Montague is not a significantly shorter route than to Sturdies Bay, and Montague Harbour is closer to Sturdies by land than Fulford is to Long Harbour. The only major factor in favour of Monague is that it is much more sheltered in rough weather than Sturdies Bay. Could BC Ferries save a bit of money on Salt Spring by operating two terminals instead of three? Yes, probably they could. Would it be enough of a savings to offset the capital cost that would be required to make such a change possible? I don't know. I suspect that it might take quite a few years to come out ahead on that. What do I see as possibly feasible? Closing Long Harbour and moving route 9's base of operations to Fulford Harbour. That would probably require a second berth at Fulford & maybe expansion of the holding area. It would also mean lengthening of route 9 by 5 minutes, maybe 10. When Montegue Harbour was closed Swartz Bay based vessels required increased time & distance to access Galiano via Sturdies Bay. Furthermore, additional vessel transits were required through the already busy and congested waterway we call Active Pass. The closing of Montegue Harbour probably made little sense to ferry users back when it was done, but BC Ferries did it anyways. Might the 21st century edition of BC Ferries apply that same logic on Salt Spring? Time will tell. Long ago, I heard of a potential Gulf Islands model with a Route 1A - Tsawwassen-Gulf Islands-Victoria. I feel that this model would be most effective with the closing of Long Harbour.
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Mayne
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Post by Mayne on Oct 3, 2012 19:04:09 GMT -8
Mileage photo your timing of the route 1A comment is perfect to what I was just about to post. Long story short I just finished a long conversation with a few of my days old friends and as usual a conversation around BC Ferries was a hot topic at dinner. It was brought up that during the week why doesn't the route 1 vessel stop at say Mayne on its way to and from Victoria then have the small ferries do drops to the other islands from there as they already do. It was stated by one of the guys that this had been done in the past, I told him I was unaware of this and would look in to the statement. (I have never seen any evidence of this and if anyone can enlighten me if this had been the case in the past I would appreciate it) I have thought of a run like this in the past but was never really about to figure all the logistics around it, but not running a half empty (at best) run in the winter would defiantly save a respectable amount of money.
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Post by Mike C on Oct 3, 2012 20:45:24 GMT -8
Just doing some quick math in my head while I'm on the SkyTrain here, I believe this would be possible with two 175 AEQ vessels with a 2.5 hour recovery time (same as Route 30), allowing for a 15 min stopover, 7.5 min to get in, 7.5 min to get out. It would also allow for some redundancy on Route 1.
If this were to go ahead I would recommend making this route and Route 1 100% reservation only (free online/over the phone) to help better allocate traffic and for travelers to plan their trips in advance.
This would connect with two other ferries which would do a loop within the inner Gulf (one clockwise, one counter-clockwise).
Thoughts?
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Mayne
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Post by Mayne on Oct 3, 2012 21:32:02 GMT -8
The only problem I ever saw with the idea was are the over heights that would have to be pushed off because well the very obvious reason of all route 9 traffic would have to be on the lower deck. Is there enough water at village bay for the super Cs to dock?
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Post by lmtengs on Oct 3, 2012 21:38:46 GMT -8
The only problem I ever saw with the idea was are the over heights that would have to be pushed off because well the very obvious reason of all route 9 traffic would have to be on the lower deck. Is there enough water at village bay for the super Cs to dock? Totally unrelated, but there's enough water for a Spirit to dock at Sturdies Bay, if they were to make that the midway stop. If a Spirit can dock there, I can't see why a Coastal couldn't.
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Neil
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Post by Neil on Oct 3, 2012 21:47:06 GMT -8
I know that re-arranging ferry routes is the absolute surest way to get an active thread on this forum, but do people not think that if this made logistical sense, BC Ferries would have done it already? They've had a very compliant (to the point of negligence) government in Victoria for eleven years now.
In reply to mayne's question, back in the sixties, the Queen of Sidney's route one crossings sometimes included Gulf Islands stops, to augment Queen of The Islands' service.
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Post by Ferryman on Oct 4, 2012 0:14:10 GMT -8
It was also tried in the 1990's with the Queen of Victoria as well apparently. The Queen of Victoria was the 5th vessel on Route 1. I can't remember if this was before or after the Spirits were built though. But the Victoria would usually depart on the half hour instead of the hour like the other vessels, but then would stop in Village Bay. There was a long term plan to double deck Berth 2 at Village Bay as well. It is basically an identical berth to Berth 3 at Swartz Bay, Tsawwassen, etc, but without the upper deck of course. It was built to have the extra deck added some day, but it has never happened. Sort of reminds me of Berth 1 at Langdale too. As for Salt Spring, it's a bit of a sticky situation all around. Long Harbour makes complete sense in the summer time when the Bowen Queen is running. You'll see the parking lot full on those Bowen Sailings strictly due to the convenience of being able to directly sail to Tsawwassen and not have to follow the milk run, or deal with the frustrating connection at Swartz Bay. BC Ferries needs to have a better system in place to accomodate connecting passengers and vehicles at Swartz Bay before they can ever expect Salt Springers to be forced to use the Route 4/1 connection. Connection times are really tight for the odd hour sailings on Route 1, and same for coming back. If any of the ferries are held up at all, the connecting ferry won't wait for those connecting passengers. So at the very least, the Route 4 schedule would need to be altered in some way that allows more time for people to turn around and re-enter the terminal. This could mean sailing the Skeena faster than normal, which means she'll burn alot more fuel. The Skeena can actually do the crossing in 25 minutes if she's making 15 knots (full speed). Right now she does it in 35 minutes making only about 11 knots. Fulford Harbour terminal is getting a slight expansion, and same with Vesuvius terminal. The plan was released during a Ferry Advisory meeting on Salt Spring not too long ago, and the plan would be to widen the approach to the terminal from 3 to 4 lanes. As it is, Fulford terminal itself holds about 50 cars, and there's only only one holding lane that goes part way up the hill before it bottle necks to the one lane each way. A full Skeena load is around 7-10 car lengths before the Beaver Point Rd turn off, which is nearly completely abeam of the Skeena's offshore end when she's in dock. The plan would be to have the road wide enough to at least accomodate a full Skeena load, and also allow for vehicles access Beaver Point road and Fulford village without having to take the serious gamble and drive down the wrong side of the road. The Skeena is quite busy during the day as it is, and overloads are not uncommon even mid day, mid week. Traffic doesn't taper off until the 7:00pm sailing. So in order to accomodate traffic from Route 9, another vessel would need to help out with Route 4 in order to keep up with the demand. Here's an article from July, that highlights some of the plans and issues we face today at these terminals. My impression is that these are plans to contend with current issues, and without any consideration to the closure of Long Harbour. www.gulfislandsdriftwood.com/news/125514243.htmlAlso, here's a look at the Master plan itself from BC Ferries www.bcferries.com/files/AboutBCF/publicconsultation/presentations_and_reports/Open_House_-_July_2011.pdf
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Post by Curtis on Oct 4, 2012 0:32:09 GMT -8
Looking at the Long Harbour/Fulford Harbour Debate a little bit, I think Ganges Residents might be a bit sour to losing Long Harbour in favour of Fulford, but, is the 20 Minute Drive to Fulford that much trouble? Then again, I'm not a local... Looking at a Map, if the Queen of Nanaimo didn't have to stop at Pender, this debate might be moot... When you think about it, Long Harbour is open because it is located near the largest populated area of the Island as the fastest connection to the Mainland. This is also an arguing point for not closing Departure Bay and might be why Route 11 runs to Skidegate over Masset. I'm sure there's millions of dollars in fuel waiting to be saved if Masset was the Port of Call. Not to mention less to no time in Hecate, that should give you 3 or 4 less hours on the vomit comet... Oh, excuse me, the Northern Adventure. Looking at the area around Masset though, your choices for sheltered water to build the terminal in might hinder the time and fuel saved. Back on Saltspring, another thought pops in my head on this ramble. What if Route 6 operations moved to Crofton? Hear me out, Crofton and Chemainus aren't far from each other so the employee pool for Route 6 and 20 could merge. It would be quite the Layoff Fest on Saltspring though...
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Post by Low Light Mike on Oct 4, 2012 6:31:31 GMT -8
I'll jump into this discussion to say that a key impediment to combining routes into 1 terminal is both the cost to improve the terminal (an extra berth perhaps, and more holding area, etc), and in some cases is impossible.
Fulford is an example of impossible for handling multiple routes, because of lack of room for any type of terminal or approach expansion. As Ferryman has noted earlier, there is a band-aid plan for road widening, but that's all. - It is impossible to expand the Fulford terminal further. At least impossible if overall cost-savings were the original intention.
Crofton & Chemainus terminals also would be impossible to expand to handle double-routes. Why impossible? Well, think about their locations and already cramped facilities, and then try to reason how they could possibly handle 2 routes. - If they could be expanded, the land-acquisition cost and infrastructure cost would exceed the savings from closing the other terminal.
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Post by gordon on Oct 4, 2012 7:19:26 GMT -8
I always thought Tsawwassen - Duke Point made money. There is an article on the Sun's website that lumps it in with the money losing minor routes.
Do only routes 1 & 2 make money?
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Post by WettCoast on Oct 4, 2012 8:59:46 GMT -8
I always thought Tsawwassen - Duke Point made money. There is an article on the Sun's website that lumps it in with the money losing minor routes. Do only routes 1 & 2 make money? That Van Sun article is located here. Happy reading...
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Post by WettCoast on Oct 4, 2012 9:27:15 GMT -8
.. and might be why Route 11 runs to Skidegate over Masset. I'm sure there's millions of dollars in fuel waiting to be saved if Masset was the Port of Call. Not to mention less to no time in Hecate, that should give you 3 or 4 less hours on the vomit comet... Oh, excuse me, the Northern Adventure. There is a very simple reason why route 11 goes to Skidegate and not Masset - serious navigational issues! Hecate Strait and Dixon Entrance (the body of water to the north of Haida Gwaii) are very shallow; so shallow that in many spots BC Ferries vessels are actually likely to foul the bottom. This is particularly so at Rose Spit, which extends well out into Dixon Entrance beyond what you see on on ordinary map. Furthermore, sea conditions in Dixon Entrance are usually worse than in Hecate Strait. Lastly, there would be the issue of finding a suitable terminal site at or near Masset. If a Masset route had of been viable I am certain that BCFC would have chosen to go that way back 32 years ago in 1980. A Masset route would have allowed them to save a huge amount of time and fuel if such was actually feasible.
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Post by Curtis on Oct 4, 2012 10:27:45 GMT -8
Crofton & Chemainus terminals also would be impossible to expand to handle double-routes. Why impossible? Well, think about their locations and already cramped facilities, and then try to reason how they could possibly handle 2 routes. - If they could be expanded, the land-acquisition cost and infrastructure cost would exceed the savings from closing the other terminal. I do agree, but you may of missed the point of what I was saying. All I was suggesting was if the HSQ was Berthed in Crofton, there would be a few more employment opportunities in that area and casual employees living in Chemainus could relieve in Crofton and vice-versa. Kind of similar to how Saltspring casuals presently have Long Harbour, Fulford, and Vesuvius. It wouldn't get off the ground though since the Watches on Route 6 would have to move to Crofton or lose their job. Of course, these are the ramblings of the guy who just got laid off by BC Ferries so I'll stop.
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