Bay Ferries
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| Bay Ferries | |
 |
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| Type of Company | Private Company |
|---|---|
| Founded | Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island (1997) |
| Headquarters | Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada |
| Key people | Mark MacDonald, President & CEO |
| Industry | Transportation |
| Products | Ferry service |
| Revenue | N/A CAN |
| Employees | N/A (2006) |
| Website | www.bayferries.com |
Bay Ferries Limited, referred to simply as Bay Ferries, is a ferry company operating in eastern Canada and the United States and is headquartered in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. It is a subsidiary of Northumberland Ferries Limited (NFL) and a sister company to Bay Ferries Great Lakes Limited.
Bay Ferries began operations in 1997 upon being awarded the operating licenses for ferry routes in the Bay of Fundy and Gulf of Maine which were being discontinued by federal Crown corporation Marine Atlantic as part of cost-cutting measures.
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[edit] Bay of Fundy
Bay Ferries operates the ferry service across the Bay of Fundy between Saint John, New Brunswick and Digby, Nova Scotia using the vessel M/V Princess of Acadia, although the service is scheduled to be discontinued in the fall of 2006. This ferry service was a continuation of steamship service begun in the 1800s and expanded upon by the Dominion Atlantic Railway and subsequently the Canadian Pacific Railway. The service originally operated from dockside rail facilities at Long Wharf in Saint John and the current public wharf in Digby.
The current terminals in Saint John and Digby were constructed in 1969 by the federal government under an agreement with Canadian Pacific and the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. CP was to build a new ferry Princess of Acadia (built in 1971), the federal government would construct and own the new ferry terminals, and the provincial governments would construct new roads to link the terminals with the respective highway networks. If CP ever encountered an operating loss, it was agreed that the federal government would take over responsibility for the service.
The service became unprofitable for CP in 1974 and the federal government stepped in, providing an operating subsidy to maintain the service. In 1976, the service (and the vessel Princess of Acadia) were transferred to Canadian National Railway and in 1977 was grouped under a separate subsidiary CN Marine. In 1986 this subsidiary was made a separate Crown corporation Marine Atlantic.
Bay Ferries has continued to operate the year-round service since 1997 using Princess of Acadia which, along with the ferry terminals, is owned by the Government of Canada. Bay Ferries is unsubsidized. Crossing time is approximately 3 hours.
On June 30, 2006; Bay Ferries announced plans to discontinue the Princess of Acadia service effective October 31, citing a 25% dropoff in passenger totals since 1998 [1]. The announcement met with widespread opposition, with a group of employees organizing the "Save The Ferry" committee to help save their jobs and the service. Over 130 jobs would be directly terminated as well as hundreds (possibly thousands) indirectly. The federal government, which still owns the vessel, as well as the provincial government of Nova Scotia and municipalities on both sides, looked at possible solutions. The Nova Scotia government and Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency offered a combined $6 million to subsidize the service, with additional funding expected from New Brunswick [2]. On October 29, a deal between the federal government and Bay Ferries was reached that will keep the service in operation until at least 2008. [3]
[edit] Gulf of Maine
Bay Ferries operates the ferry service across the Gulf of Maine from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia to Bar Harbor, Maine and from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia to Portland, Maine using a high speed catamaran ferry service using the marketing name "The Cat".
This ferry route was initiated in 1955 by the Government of Canada at the insistence of tourism operators and fish exporters in southwestern Nova Scotia. Throughout the 1800s and early 1900s, steamship service from Yarmouth to New York, Boston and Portland, Maine had been provided by various operators, lastly the Dominion Atlantic Railway, subsequently Canadian Pacific Railway. The resurrected service in 1955 saw new ferry terminals constructed in Yarmouth and Bar Harbor and used the newly commissioned ferry MV Bluenose, named after Nova Scotia's famous racing schooner Bluenose.
The service was operated by Canadian National Railways (later Canadian National Railway) and in 1977 was included in the CN reorganization which created CN Marine. In 1982 a newer vessel MV Stena Jutlandica was purchased and renamed MV Bluenose (replacing the previous vessel). In 1986 CN Marine became Marine Atlantic which continued to operate the service, although it was scaled back to a seasonal May-October operation by the mid-1990s. Since the Gulf of Maine service operated to the United States, the vessel was not owned by the Government of Canada and was solely the responsibility of CN and later Marine Atlantic.
Following government-mandated service cutbacks to Marine Atlantic in the mid-1990s, Bay Ferries was formed as a subsidiary of NFL and successfully bid for the right to operate the Yarmouth-Bar Harbor route. Upon taking control of the operation in 1997, Bay Ferries continued to operate the MV Bluenose that year, after which it was sold.
Bay Ferries entered into a purchase agreement in late 1997 with Incat in Hobart, Australia for the HSC INCAT 046, a wave-piercing catamaran ferry operating on the Melbourne-Devonport service by TT-line) under the brand name "Devil Cat." Upon acquisition of the vessel in 1998, Bay Ferries began using the term "The Cat" for its Yarmouth-Bar Harbor service in logos on the vessel and in Bay Ferries marketing material. It should be noted that "The Cat" is merely the marketing name for the ferry service operated by Bay Ferries, and not the name of the vessel, which remains HSC INCAT 046. The introduction of HSC INCAT 046 to the Gulf of Maine met with great publicity and interest among Canadian and American media as this was the first, and currently the fastest (41 knots), large-capacity high speed ferry in North America, cutting the trip time between both ports from six hours on a conventional vessel to less than three hours. In 2002, Incat 046 was sold and the current vessel HSC INCAT 059 replaced it.
The high speed ferry can operate between both ports in 2 hours and 30 minutes, compared with a crossing time of over 6 hours using a conventional ferry vessel. It should be noted that the high speed service is seasonal and does not operate during the late fall, winter and early spring when severe ocean storms could inhibit crossings, although the conventional vessels were year-round services for many years.
The federal government maintains ownership of the ferry terminal in Yarmouth but has given Bay Ferries operating and management rights to the facility.
In spring 2005 rival Gulf of Maine ferry operator Scotia Prince Cruises announced that it was cancelling its Portland, Maine-Yarmouth service offered by a conventional vessel, M/S Scotia Prince as a result of toxic mould problems at the old Portland Marine Terminal. The city of Portland was constructing a replacement terminal, however it assumed that financial difficulties would prevent Scotia Prince from returning to the Yarmouth service and entered into discussions with Bay Ferries about expanding its Gulf of Maine service to include Portland, in addition to Bar Harbor. An announcement was made in late summer that Bay Ferries would include "The Cat" service to both ports from Yarmouth beginning in 2006 using HSC INCAT 059.
[edit] Trinidad and Tobago
Beginning on January 10, 2005. Bay Ferries started operating HSC INCAT 059 under a wet charter to provide a ferry service in the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. The Government of Trinidad and Tobago chartered the vessel and a Bay Ferries crew for six months to service the country's ferry route considered a 'sea bridge' between the islands of Trinidad and Tobago.[4]
Under the terms of the charter, the government agreed to pay Bay Ferries US$23,800 per day to ferry persons, goods, and vehicles between the two islands. The HSC INCAT 059 (still using its service trademark "The Cat") was taken from its seasonal layup to the Caribbean before returning to the Gulf of Maine for its regular six-month summer schedule. During the winter of 2003-2004 HSC INCAT 059 briefly tested a route between Florida and the Bahamas.
The Government of Trinidad and Tobago has been in the process of trying to purchase a fast ferry to serve the inter-island route all year long. The other vessel used by Bay Ferries in Trinidad and Tobago service during May-October is the HSC INCAT 046, now known as the "Lynx" from New Zealand and formerly used by Bay Ferries on the Gulf of Maine before the INCAT 059 (See above).
On April 21, 2005 HSC INCAT 059 became an indispensable link between the two islands after a Tobago Express aircraft had problems with its landing gear over the 'air bridge' route. The entire Tobago Express fleet was grounded for several days pending inspections to the fleet and citizens were left depending fully on the high speed ferry service.
During the 2004-2005 winter season HSC INCAT 059 ferried almost 175,000 passengers and a total of about 25,000 vehicles between the islands.[5]
The Government of Trinidad and Tobago announced that HSC INCAT 059 would return to offer inter-island service in November 2005 until the following May.[6] The government has announced it will examine purchasing its own fast ferry to avoid having to rely on wet charters in future.
