One often hears the tall tales of a long ago ferry service that ran with a schedule as frequent and reliable as a Toronto streetcar and with food worthy of a Cunard liner, but the reality I’ve known all my life is that Sunshine Coasters have never had a ferry service that met all our wants and needs.
The reality I’ve come to accept for the future is that we never will.
But, there’s a new effort afoot to develop what Transportation Minister Claire Trevena calls “a broad provincial vision so we can be sure that we have the right ferry services in place in the future.” The next step is an online engagement process that starts soon (see story Page 4).
I want to do my part. In fact, over the Christmas break I had new business cards made: “Sean Eckford: Ferry Futurist. Board today, disembark in the future!”
You may be thinking that letting me envision the future of coastal ferry services will turn out like that episode of The Simpsons where Homer gets to design a car, but I assure you my vision is firmly grounded. So grounded, in fact, it doesn’t even touch the water.
In a column in Georgia Straight last November, Alex Boston, the executive director of a think tank called Renewable Cities, put forward his vision of a future BC Ferries system with a “focus on communities, carbon reduction, and clean tech, not cars and congestion.”
Boston sees a network of passenger ferries as a supplement to the vehicle ferries and he points out, rightly, that reducing the number of vehicles using the system, even by a small percentage, will make it run better and cut congestion on the roads.
But, running a bunch of passenger ferries won’t reduce the vehicle traffic at the terminals in places where there’s not an easy way for people to get there without a car. You’d just be replacing congestion on the boat with congestion in the parking lot (a problem we’ve already got at Langdale).
Which is where my “grounded” vision for a better marine highway comes in. If we’re going to take the idea of passenger-only ferry service to Horseshoe Bay, downtown Vancouver and maybe even YVR or Nanaimo seriously, we’ve got to start on land – with a transit system that actually serves the whole Coast.
It will take regular buses between Langdale and Earls Cove and feeder routes or park and ride lots that make them easily accessible. We’re also going to need a really good bus link from Saltery Bay to Powell River.
In our interview last month, Trevena told me a lot of people she’s heard from so far want seamless travel – the example she gave was to be able to get on a bus, get to the ferry, get where you’re going and get on another bus and pay for it all at one go.
We are now nearing the future, please prepare to disembark.
