The ferry ride from Balfour to Kootenay Bay takes 35 minutes, the same time as the trip from Swartz Bay to Saltspring Island’s Fulford Harbour. The Kootenay Lake trip is free; the ride to Saltspring Island costs nearly $60 for a car and two passengers.
The government provides, for free, the 20-minute ferry ride from Shelter Bay across Upper Arrow Lake to Galena, but its ferry corporation charges $35 for the 10-minute ride from Buckley Bay to Denman Island.
The inland ferry system is regarded as part of the highway system, the coastal ferry system isn’t. Why?
If the Kootenay ferry service stopped, the result would be, at most, inconvenience — people could still drive from Nelson to Creston on pavement. Without the Saltspring ferry service, the island’s residents would be stranded and its commerce crippled.
B.C.’s inland ferry service is part of the Ministry of Transportation and charges no fares, while coastal ferries operate under a supposedly independent corporation that is constantly raising fares. Those rising fares, says a study done by the Union of B.C. Municipalities, have reduced ridership and have hit coastal communities with higher costs, reduced business and lower real-estate values. The result, says the report, is a $2.3-billion loss to the B.C. economy.
The dichotomy of the two ferry services is no mystery. Most of the inland ferry routes take five or 10 minutes, and the vessels required are much cheaper to operate than those that ply coastal routes. It’s all about money.
Sweet things were whispered in our ears when the B.C. Liberal government went through the motions of privatizing B.C. Ferries: “The new structure will help ensure services are delivered on time and on budget,” said Judith Reid, transportation minister at the time. “It will create a vibrant, properly managed ferry system that improves customer service, creates new jobs for coastal communities, ensures stable rates and is sustainable for the future.”
Trouble is, we Islanders — and others who depend on coastal ferries — are not a cheap date when it comes to ferry service. While the two major ferry routes make money, the others can never be profitable, especially the northern routes.
But then, highways and bridges aren’t profitable either, and no one expects them to be. It is accepted that the cost of building and maintaining transportation infrastructure is something we share as taxpayers. Ferries should be regarded as part of that infrastructure and ferry routes as extensions of highways.
B.C. Transit fares pay about a third of the cost of running the system; ferry passengers pay more than 70 per cent of the ferry system’s costs. Vancouver Islanders’ taxes help build highways through the province, including the $800-million Sea-to-Sky Highway. We understand — it’s good for the whole province. Let’s regard ferries in the same light.
When his government formed the provincial ferry system more than 50 years ago, former premier W.A.C. Bennett understood that ferries were vital to the well-being of island and coastal communities.
B.C.’s ferry system has enabled regions to grow and thrive that would have otherwise dwindled. People built homes and followed dreams on the promise that ferries would serve them. Raising fares beyond affordability breaks that promise.
While we might look with envy at the free inland ferries, we also recognize reality. The operation of those little ferries is minute compared to the cost of the coastal ferry system.
We do not expect nor do we propose that coastal ferry fares be abolished — that would be unwise — but the fares should be affordable, and that can be achieved by spreading the load among all British Columbians.
