Editor:
I imagine everyone on the Coast is very happy with the current hourly service. Operating two ferries with lower load capacities makes so much sense and means less wait times and more on-time service.
The downside from BC Ferries’ point of view is the increased fuel and crew cost.
So which is more important – servicing customers or reducing costs?
Clearly for Coast residents, the former.
But whenever did the senior management (I use the term very loosely) of BC Ferries actually listen to the customers they serve?
The incoming CEO, Mark Collins, is on record as having said he was not interested in discussing user complaints or fares or apparently anything else that users might have to say.
So on April 7 we go back to the same old broken business model of one ferry and a two-hour schedule, which for most of the summer months with full loads means regular and continual delays.
The idea of using two smaller ferries on a one-hour schedule makes so much sense to most people, but common sense seems never to have made its way into the upper echelons of BC Ferries management, who seem more interested in awarding themselves healthy bonuses rather than servicing the customers who are forced to use the monopoly service.
Rather than build a fixed link connection, fix the ferry service and treat it like an extension of the highway system with an hourly service.
Buzz Bennett, Gibsons
