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Post by futureferrydriver on May 16, 2020 16:25:25 GMT -8
I think one of the issues with the Forum Flagship nowadays is the fact that many users are like myself and use the Tapatalk app. The only time we actually see the photos is when they are posted and when the poll is setup. Tapatalk has no option for displaying the flagship like the website. My two cents I’d like to mirror this thought. As someone who visits the forum from mobile (just my phones web browser) 99.9% of the time I very rarely see the flagship header and this certainly leads to a lack of interest/caring about what it is.
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Post by futureferrydriver on May 1, 2020 5:44:35 GMT -8
Here’s an interesting COVID side effect I noticed this morning while loading in Tsawwassen (yes, my travel is essential...). Due to the high (as in higher demand than there is capacity) amount of commercial traffic BC Ferries has been loading underheight towables (ie. underheight vehicles with underheight trailers) on the upper deck. Typically this was a big no-no, but seems like a good solution to free up a bit more space on the lower deck for those who actually need the height. It always annoyed me to leave behind a semi truck because a bunch of pop-up tent trailers went on the bottom deck even though they could have fit up top.
The reason of course is the tighter turns on the upper ramp don’t always work well for trailers, but this is really only an issue for Horseshoe Bay. I would hope after the pandemic BC Ferries considers continuing this practice on routes 1 and 30, now that it has clearly been demonstrated as possible.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Apr 23, 2020 11:42:45 GMT -8
Looking at reservations for an upcoming (and essential...) move and BC Ferries has commercial reservations available for Swartz Bay to Tsawwassen on the Salish Raven with 3 hour trip lengths (6:20am - 9:15am and 3:45pm - 6:40pm). I knew they had been using the SGI milk run for extra capacity on route 1 but its interesting to see it reservable like this. This is for May 2nd specifically, but presumably other days as well.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Apr 3, 2020 17:28:10 GMT -8
how come they dident keep one boat for route 2 for the public then just have the commercial boat for route 30?? Also curious to why they dident use just one boat for route 1?? Looks with that schedule each Spirit is doing a shift! Each boat getting one shift balances the layoff between Tsawwassen and Swartz Bay crew. SoVI is Swartz based so they’re at least keeping some workers. SoBC is the same thing for Tsawwassen. Seems fairer than keeping twice as many employees on one side, that’s my guess as to why.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Apr 3, 2020 12:12:31 GMT -8
I am wonder if the ships can handle this demand while keeping physically distance because these could be 100% fell which ain’t that good for physical distances. I wonder how soon BC Ferries may addition sailings to this schedule to keep everyone safe while maintaining reasonable balance service? This won't be an issue. We've seen people pushing back against service reductions in transportation of all forms (public transit, planes, and now ferries) with this argument, but the reality is that demand is falling even quicker than service levels. The traffic levels are lower overall (foot pax and vehicles), more people are travelling in cars if they have the option (to avoid bus and public spaces) and those people are staying in their cars, as are truckers and everyone on deck 2. The passenger areas of the ferries will be emptier than ever, despite service cuts.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jan 19, 2020 16:24:16 GMT -8
So what’s the deal with the Cumberland on route 5 how come she never uses berth 2?? I was on the Raven yesterday and berth 2 was available but yet she waited for us to clear berth 4 before she docked. Seems kinda odd. I’d wager a bet that it’s because the Coastal on route 1 would arrive and need berth 2 before the Cumby would have departed. The Salt Spring ship generally arrives ~10 minutes before the route 1 ship but leaves at the same time.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 26, 2019 7:53:54 GMT -8
This article refers to the Island Class vessels.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 24, 2019 19:37:57 GMT -8
The massive bus loop does seem a bit ridiculous, but they're likely including areas for coach buses and school buses to be properly staged. This will be an improvement over the current set up. A summer afternoon at the Swartz Bay parking lot is a good reminder that not enough bus parking can be a serious pain in the butt! The second exit is the single most important improvement that can be made to Horseshoe Bay terminal. As it stands for all 3 routes that service HSB (which can mean up to 6 different vessels in the summer) there is only one way for cars to get off the boats, meaning only one ship can unload at a time. You can probably already see the problem here, but wait there's more!! Since the only exit is on the south side of the terminal, if berth 3 is unloading than no loading can even be done at berth 1 or 2 as the traffic passes across these berth to get to the exit (similarly if berth 1 or 2 is loading then berth 3 can't unload). The schedule for routes servicing HSB is a delicately crafted piece of art to mesh all of these weird operational requirements together (including stuff like Langdale needs to be berth 3 always, Coastal needs berth 1 etc.) and minimize the time ships are spent sitting waiting to load or unload. Of course there is little margin for error here and (as is often the case) once one ship gets delayed it will inevitably prevent another ship from loading or unloading on time. This creates a domino effect and is a huge part of why route 3 often gets delayed by literally hours. The second exit gives operations at HSB a huge amount of flexibility. What we would likely see is berth 3 (Langdale) always using the new exit so that the Langdale run can operate essentially unaffected by the other two routes. Meanwhile berth 2 has the freedom to exit either side of the terminal depending on where traffic needs to be loaded. I don't see a huge operational benefit to lining up the 3 berths out farther into the water. If I had to guess I'd say doing so gives them more holding space in the terminal, and potentially more room to work on the construction of other aspects of the project. But not many coach buses go to Horseshoe Bay. I truly don’t think the second exit would be useful if only the upper deck uses it because that is half of cars from route 3 vessels. How would vehicles from lower deckers get access to the second exit? 1. Sure not a lot go there NOW, but still it seems like a justifiable feature to include when upgrading the terminal amenities. Even if its just for the Bowen Islanders school bus it seems worth it to me. Plus it will be nice to have a proper spot for the Tofino bus! Perhaps extra bus parking will encourage a future stop at Horseshoe bay for some of the Vancouver to Whistler shuttle buses. In general more and better bus accommodations are almost always better. 2. The diagram isn’t clear but it looks like the second exit does include both decks. It would be utterly ridiculous to spend millions blasting into the hill if it only made a second exit for the upper deck, so I am almost positive the lower ramp will exit this way too.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 24, 2019 7:52:27 GMT -8
I find the following quote from Mark Collins to be quite saddening: “Our goal is that you’ll have to read the name on the ship to know what ship you’re on, that is how identical they will be. “Nobody knows what plane you get on, you just know its another 737,” he said. I realize they've been talking about standardization for years and years and it will probably never actually come to this in my lifetime, but its discouraging to hear that this is the goal. I've always liked the little quirks that make each ship unique.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 24, 2019 7:43:38 GMT -8
I have say some of design are odd, such as massive transit centre only couple of buses have terminus there. How would an second exit help? How would berth being the in lineup help terminal operations? The massive bus loop does seem a bit ridiculous, but they're likely including areas for coach buses and school buses to be properly staged. This will be an improvement over the current set up. A summer afternoon at the Swartz Bay parking lot is a good reminder that not enough bus parking can be a serious pain in the butt! The second exit is the single most important improvement that can be made to Horseshoe Bay terminal. As it stands for all 3 routes that service HSB (which can mean up to 6 different vessels in the summer) there is only one way for cars to get off the boats, meaning only one ship can unload at a time. You can probably already see the problem here, but wait there's more!! Since the only exit is on the south side of the terminal, if berth 3 is unloading than no loading can even be done at berth 1 or 2 as the traffic passes across these berth to get to the exit (similarly if berth 1 or 2 is loading then berth 3 can't unload). The schedule for routes servicing HSB is a delicately crafted piece of art to mesh all of these weird operational requirements together (including stuff like Langdale needs to be berth 3 always, Coastal needs berth 1 etc.) and minimize the time ships are spent sitting waiting to load or unload. Of course there is little margin for error here and (as is often the case) once one ship gets delayed it will inevitably prevent another ship from loading or unloading on time. This creates a domino effect and is a huge part of why route 3 often gets delayed by literally hours. The second exit gives operations at HSB a huge amount of flexibility. What we would likely see is berth 3 (Langdale) always using the new exit so that the Langdale run can operate essentially unaffected by the other two routes. Meanwhile berth 2 has the freedom to exit either side of the terminal depending on where traffic needs to be loaded. I don't see a huge operational benefit to lining up the 3 berths out farther into the water. If I had to guess I'd say doing so gives them more holding space in the terminal, and potentially more room to work on the construction of other aspects of the project.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 23, 2019 6:43:00 GMT -8
Any thoughts on the Horseshoe Bay renderings? dailyhive.com/vancouver/bc-ferries-horseshoe-bay-terminal-rebuild-designThat's an enormous bill, but I guess it ain't cheap to build in such a confined space. I bet staging the construction will be enormously complicated... they'd likely have to expand the holding area before they do any other work on existing structures. What my armchair engineering self expects to see is this: First they blast into the rock (night work I’d imagine, likely can’t do that with people around) to get started on the second exit. Then before they start using it as a second exit this area can be used for normal vehicle holding. This would give them (probably?) enough space to re-do the double decker holding area (Langdale and Bowen lanes) to whatever extent is needed. The toughest part on regular operations might be adding the overpass to connect the second exit with the main exit highway. As a bit of a construction geek I’ve been hugley interesting in watching the Lower Lynn highway project develop in North Van (and McKenzie interchange in Victoria) over the last few years. I’m sure it will be amazing to see how they manage to do all of this and keep the terminal operating (somewhat) normally.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 9, 2019 20:26:27 GMT -8
wow. i cant believe these discount sailings have been going on for 13yrs already. personally, i think its brilliant as im poor and quite price sensitive on things i can control, like choice of sailing.
im confused why the super late midnite runs are not included though. any of you know why?
I’m 96% sure they didn’t exist this year... It definitely wasn’t worth it last year so for Fridays this season they kept the 6am departures and left out the 10pm’s. I didn’t work there this summer so I can’t say that with 100% certainty but I’m fairly sure that was the standard Friday this summer.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Sept 2, 2019 11:18:13 GMT -8
I just try to be on the new(er) ferries for the Seawest. Spirit or Coastal, it doesn't matter. I have never missed a sailing in the car or on foot. Sorry everyone, I always make sure it is not the (do not kill me) the New West. I dodge the New West whenever possible specifically because I like getting soft serve ice cream. That said my usually Friday routine is to bike from UVic to Swartz Bay aiming for the 5pm sailing. I often budget too much time for this and make it on the 4pm New West; this makes the New West one of the ferries I use most, go figure... I suppose I’m saving $5 on ice cream each trip but that hardly feels like a consolation.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Aug 24, 2019 6:55:30 GMT -8
Is there any particular logic behind as to when the platform decks are used on the Queen of Cumberland? Traveling on the 1435 to Otter Bay on Friday and curious as to whether they will be used or not. If there is more traffic than fits on the main deck then they have to use the platforms. I’m pretty sure there isn’t any other factors.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jul 28, 2019 19:13:02 GMT -8
Definitely a good point. Especially if they want to be able to sub these newer ships in for use of route 2,3 and 30. I hope that for future double enders they deal with the noise problems affecting the Coastals. As it stands the Spirits are the only ships using berth 1 at SWB (Coastals prop is too loud = unhappy neighbours). It would be a shame if the new ships are stuck using berth 2 when operationally berth 1 is unquestionably the superior berth. Maybe berth 2 is easier for double ended because there doesn’t seems to be easier to change routing for inbound sailing to Swartz Bay for use berth 1 Coastal Class vessels. The could just approach by the way the Spirits normally depart! Its roughly the same distance I think.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jul 26, 2019 8:11:07 GMT -8
Thank You for mentioning that. I didn't really think about how long it would take to unload and then load 500 cars again in less than 25 minutes because that would cause some ferry delays and even then, who knows how busy the run will be in 20 years, it may not be as busy and one way we could get a lot of these car passengers as walk on passengers is by increasing transit service at both Tsawwassen and Swartz Bay like a Canada Line Extention down to Tsawwassen and a few more bus routes to Tsawwassen and more bus service to Swartz Bay and I could see the problem with having a ferry for this big of a route having a sailing at a complete random time instead of on the exact hour. One of the issues with the Spirit's is that they are single ended; they have to swing their bows around so they are facing the right way at one end, while at the other end, they have to back in stern first. That eats up time compared to the Coastal's, which are double ended.
Another advantage of the Coastal's is that they are also slightly faster, which allows them to make up time enroute over the day if there is a delay. If a Spirit gets delayed, the rest of the schedule for a Spirit gets screwed over as a result for the entire day.
Definitely a good point. Especially if they want to be able to sub these newer ships in for use of route 2,3 and 30. I hope that for future double enders they deal with the noise problems affecting the Coastals. As it stands the Spirits are the only ships using berth 1 at SWB (Coastals prop is too loud = unhappy neighbours). It would be a shame if the new ships are stuck using berth 2 when operationally berth 1 is unquestionably the superior berth.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jul 25, 2019 10:05:10 GMT -8
IF (and I fully realize that's a big if) BC Ferries wanted to have larger vehicle capacity, how would they do it? Could they take the upper vehicle deck and make it a full two levels high with platforms? Could they do a ship with a broader beam to load a third lane of vehicles both on the upper and lower vehicle decks? I know some ships like the Ulysses and the Stena ships have all sorts of nooks and crannies for placing vehicles. And I do appreciate that the eventual trend is more walk-ons, fewer drive-ons. I would imagine a combination of longer and wider. Internal ramps just don't work very well in BC (look at the original Spirits...) so it seems very unlikely that a 3rd car deck would ever be added. In other parts of the world where the ferry trips are 8+ hours the internal ramps make sense and its not a big deal if it takes an hour to load the ship full of cars, but when the trip is only an hour and a half you don't want to double that with a lengthly loading procedure. Speaking of longer and wider I seriously wonder how much bigger BCF could go (hypothetically if they wanted the biggest ship possible). They might be able to get another lane or two of width and still fit into the existing berths, but going too much wider would necessitate replacing a whole lot of terminal infrastructure. Adding length is probably the easiest. I think (someone chime in if you can think of any other reasons) the only real limitation in length is handling (ie. they have to be able to make it through Active Pass, and berth quickly) and stability (longer would have to be wider for stability, but wider is limited).
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jul 22, 2019 12:42:39 GMT -8
To what extent do they (or can they; they being BCFS) put overheights in outer lanes by having them drive through the centre tunnel and then shift into an outer lane once through the tunnel, or park in an outer lane and then shift into the centre lane prior to driving off? I realize that this is probably not possible with long overheights but it ought not to be a big deal with panel vans & camper trucks, for example?
About 80% of the car deck on the BQ & the MQ has no height restriction. Perhaps the issue is more with vessel turn around time if they were to use outer lanes for overheights ...
I don’t know the exact weight or why however Transport Canada requires all commercial vehicles over a certain weight to be loaded in the Center lane regardless where on the deck they are parked on the Mayne and Bowen Queen IIRC the magic number is above the 5,500 kg commercial threshold but still pretty low, somewhere around 8,000 kg (for the Mayne Queen). With this in mind smaller box trucks, RV's and vans etc. can be driven through the center and parked onto the sides, and they do this very frequently on route 5A. Frequently enough that we call these types of vehicles 'wingables' (in reference to their ability to be loaded on the sides of the ship) and they will usually get their own lane at the terminal so they can be loaded ahead of the heavier stuff.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jul 10, 2019 7:25:43 GMT -8
So here are the things that I would like to see with these new BC Ferries. I would like to see a car capacity of 500 cars because in the future there will be even more people riding BC Ferries to get over to Vancouver Island and they are going to need to have the new vessels to have a bigger car capacity than 360 Cars. The new ferries should also have a bigger Passenger Capacity and I know this might sound crazy but I think the necessary Passenger Capacity would be 2500-3000. The reason for that is because I sometimes can't find any seats on a Coastal Class ferry and it is definitely not easy to find seats on one of the C-Class Ferries and if they have to close all vehicle decks during the Sailing then they will probably need to have a bigger Passenger Capacity than 2000. I think for the ferry it's self and what it will run on I think they should either make it so it would run on Natural Gas like the Spirit of BC and the Spirit of Vancouver Island or the other option is they could Diesel-Electric and maybe even make it fully electric in the future if that will even be possible in 30-35 years. I would also like them to instead try to make them actual new vessels instead of more up to date Coastal Class Ferries. For amenities I am expecting to see the usual Coastal Cafe, Coast Cafe Express Sitka Coffee Place or Arbutus Coffee Bar, Seawest Lounge, Passages Gift Shop, Kids Zone Washrooms and Elevators. Some other amenities that I would like to see is the Pacific Buffet on all 5 vessles because I do know that the Pacific Buffet is meant to only be available on Route 1 but Route 2 is also really popular and is almost as busy as Route 1 and at this point they might as well add it to Route 2 and for Route 30, I will get to that a bit later. I think for the Snack Bar seeing that if they were to put the Pacific Buffet on all 5 of them then they might as well put either the Coast Cafe Express or the Arbutus Coffee Bar but I think they are probably going to do Arbutus Coffee Bar because I don't really see the Coast Cafe Express on any of the newer ferries and they even removed from the Spirit Class Vessels with the Arbutus Coffee Bar. I also think they should bring back the Video Zone to these new vessels but instead of Arcade Machines they should put Game Consoles Like Nintendo Switch Xbox One and PS4 well probably by the mid 2020s it will be PS5 and Xbox Scarlett. For the Seating I would like to see TV's for all seating areas. One thing that I would like to see too is not every sailing is busy and maybe for non busy sailings they would be able to close certain areas on the vessel during the sailing. And finally I hope they are built here in BC. I don't really have a big interest in the smaller issues like what specific food and marketing options might be offered. What you need to keep in mind is if BC Ferries goes to the gigantic vessels you're suggesting, that means a considerable strain on terminal facilities, and also highway infrastructure. The plan they've articulated indicates vessels a bit bigger than what they currently have... and that makes sense. Frequency of service with manageable capacity is probably the way to go. Ditto, there's also the issue that a 500+ capacity ferry would ruin the hourly schedule of route 1. It's already a squeeze to get a full spirit turned around in 25 minutes. Maybe it's just my OCDness, but there's something hugely satisfying and simple about the ferry leaving every hour (or two) on the hour.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jun 29, 2019 20:52:10 GMT -8
I hadn't been on a ferry since early February, and so there was no better ship for me to ride recently than the mighty Quinitsa, on her new SSI route. Here's a glance at the Monday morning car-deck, surprisingly empty for a 7:40am sailing. Quinitsa by Mike Bonkowski, on Flickr Video here: The foot-passengers found their way to the variety of 4 lounges, and they seemed to be evenly dispersed into those side-lounges. I don't know if the frequent foot-passengers have found their favourite side-lounge yet. I took my first trip on the Qunitsa today. I’ve been around the ship a bit working at Swartz Bay last summer but this was my first experience from a passenger perspective. I was upset by the lack of outdoor seating compared to that of the other similar style ships (the K-barges, Skeena and Quinisam). Adding to my disappointment was the volume of the engines in all 4 of the lounges. I might have more sensitive ears than most but I can’t be alone in thinking a little sound proofing in the lounges would go a long way to improve passenger comfort.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jun 28, 2019 13:58:13 GMT -8
V2V sent out an e-mail this week with a request for feedback on a $1100 season pass for one, $2100 for two. As a very frequent Vancouver traveler I'd give this some serious consideration. At the normal walk on rate of $17.20 per person each way, this is roughly equivalent to 31 round trips. Add in (a low estimate) of $5-10 per round trip for transit between the downtowns and the ferries and $1100 is more like 24 round trips. IIRC the season for V2V is mid March to mid October, roughly 30 weeks. If the schedule was a bit better this would be pretty much a no brainer for anyone travelling (without a car) weekly. I personally go to Vancouver (via bus, walk on, bus, SkyTrain, SeaBus) about 2 out of every 3 weekends during the summer. Cost wise this would be close to the same as I spend already. The additional convenience of downtown to downtown would makes this considerably more appealing (and worth any extra money). That said as a weekend traveller an 8am departure on Sunday morning pretty much ruins my chances of using V2V for the return trip. Leaving Victoria at 4:30 on Friday is great, but I want to be able to spend most of my Sunday in the big city.
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jun 26, 2019 20:51:37 GMT -8
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but 0400 might be the earliest scheduled BC Ferry sailing ever?
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Post by futureferrydriver on Jun 3, 2019 8:32:41 GMT -8
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Post by futureferrydriver on May 29, 2019 11:03:06 GMT -8
BC Ferries has posted a service notice regarding the HSQ's official retirement next Tuesday: Howe Sound Queen RetirementThey do mention the fact that the replacing Quinitsa is a "smaller" ship AEQ wise, but make an attempt to justify this with the increased weight capacity of the Quinitsa. I can't imagine that will beneficial helpful on a Sunday afternoon leaving Vesuvius, but perhaps this will at least be an improvement for travellers on weekdays when there is more commercial traffic.
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Post by futureferrydriver on May 18, 2019 10:17:34 GMT -8
Am I missing something as I don't see the name of the vessel anywhere on or near the whole stern section? Were the painters short of 'blue' paint? I’m pretty sure it says it on the stern above the upper car deck just below the buffet windows... In fact I just looked at some photos from last weekend and I would say I’m 100% sure its there. Blurry and hard to see in the picture here though.
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