Riding the Quayside to Queensborough demonstration ferry is becoming a token experience.
After a popular free preview the last weekend of July and a successful first foray into paid fares during the long weekend, city staff were scrambling to buy a new supply of tokens for potential passengers to purchase.
Since exact fare is required at the dock ($2 for adults, $1 for seniors and children 6-15) for the short-term service, the city is selling ferry tokens at the Queensborough Community Centre, the Anvil Centre and Tre Galli in River Market. But by the B.C. Day holiday Monday they were almost out of the 1,000 tokens the city had ordered prior to the service’s introduction.
Mark Allison, the city’s manager of strategic initiatives and sustainability, said during the MV Hollyburn’s midday runs on the long weekend, potential passengers were left at the dock because it was full to its capacity of 40 people.
“It shows it was a very popular service, even though it was the first service that was paid,” said Allison.
The city, he said, has already received hundreds of survey responses from ferry users that can be used to determine whether or not bringing back the service on a one-year, expanded trial basis would be merited.
“The great majority are very positive about the service, and hopefully extending it,” said Allison.
The survey seeks feedback on whether the passengers would use a permanent service and when. It will be up to council to decide the eventual extent of the service, when it will start, and its hours and days of operation, said Allison.
“We’ll have a lot of data on how people say they’ll use the service, but we won’t have data on how people actually use the service throughout the year.”
The demonstration service runs on a 20-minute cycle Fridays from 5 to 9 p.m., and Saturdays, Sundays and Labour Day from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. (except for four sailings each direction for crew breaks) until Sept. 24. The downtown dock is below the Inn at the Quay between the Samson V and the Paddlewheeler Riverboat Tours docks. At the other end, the public dock on the south side of the Port Royal peninsula off of Salter Street is used.
