They threatened to do the same thing in 2005 and the Auckland Regional Transport Authority (ARTA) had to step in and provide an emergency subsidy to get them to carry on providing the services.
These ferries already cost $10 each way (at least, they do where I live) and I'm amazed anyone rides them.
Yet the logic of providing a ferry service as part of a wider regional transport network is powerful. Vancouver operate a ferry across their harbour and it is an excellent service. But none of it is private. It's all part of an integrated, publicly-owned transport network involving buses, rail, mono-rail and ferries.
Fullers no doubt are having trouble making the ferry business - all by itself - pay. They know they can't put the fares up any more. they are already more than high enough. So instead they must - effectively - hold all the ferry riders to ransom and twist the arm of the public funders to win a larger subisdy. The rising cost of fuel is probably part of this equation.
The whole problem could be avoided by having one publicly-owned transport organisation that operates on fares plus a subsidy and makes no profit. Where infrastructure is concerned, profit is an additional - and unecessary - cost.
We have already seen how inefficient a privately operated fragments of public transport are.
- Multiple ticketing systems.
- Poor coverage. Inability to invest in building usage on new routes or routes in new areas.
- Relatively high fares by global standards.
- Long walks between services operated by different providers.
- Inconsistent services between providers. Some have new buses with air conditioning. Others have old creaky buses that act like sweat boxes on a hot day.
- Few transport hubs to allow for the seamless movement between modes that are an essential part of any good service.
- Buses competing with trains instead of buses feeding passengers to trains
...and ferries that cost a bomb to use.
Hopefully the new Act allowing ARTA to create and define public transport services will see the waste and inefficiency of the private sector addressed. To to be fair, this waste and inefficiency is the result of the "market forces" ideological nonsense that lead to the present situation. Fragmented, incoherent services delivered by disparate and supposedly competing operators was never going to deliver an attractive, high quality, integrated public transport system. It hasn't anywhere else and it didn't here.
Not that the ideologues would ever accept the evidence of failure. Like any religion they simply say "You're not doing it right."
Just like my kids do.....when they have no come back.
Don't get me started on Auckland Harbour Ferries!!! One of my little red button issues is how we don't use the harbour for transport. I actually spent a bit of time looking into it once. If you built a canal from the Tamaki Estuary to the Manakau at Otahuhu (which is why there is a "Portage Road" and a "Canal Reserve" there) then in theory it would be possible to travel from Orewa to Papakura (and all points inbetween) by water, with all the roading provided by mother nature and zero cost for road maintenance. I doubt there is a spot on the Auckland Isthmus that isn't a few minutes from a potential ferry wharf. Even a 12 -16knots Vaporetto, travelling in a straight line and free of lights, give ways, etc, would be time competitive with a car. Imagine the East Coast Bays, the Waitemata, Tamaki Estuary and the Manakau dotted with 40-50 proper, modern ferry wharves, with purpose built, Venetian style Vaporetto water buses busily plying between them all. Integrated into this would be a bus system for the last mile. No need for rail, no need to purchase land for rail. And forget about the weather - the prevailing Westerlies don't push up much of a swell, and even a screaming 50-60 knots of westerly would just be an inconvenient chop with lots of spray. I calculated the number of days wind from the north, east or south would disrupt coastal services from the East Coast days is less than five per annum.
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