PORT TOWNSEND ¬– Todd Pacific Shipyards, Washington State Ferries and their design firms are six weeks into producing an electronic mock-up of the Port Townsend-Keystone route’s future 64-car ferry, which will be built by three shipyards, executives overseeing the project said Friday.
David Moseley, state deputy transportation secretary for ferries, and Steve Welch, Todd Pacific Shipyards chief executive officer, said work is now focused on developing a functional design.
Details will be added later for actual steel-on-the-ground production.
Welch said he was not ready to discuss when construction would begin on the $65.5 million, 750-passenger ferry but that the state has set a June 2010 deadline for launch of the vessel.
He said that, because of the 18-month fast-track deadline, his shipyard based on Harbor Island in Seattle will share work on the ferry.
“In this particular case, engineering is complicated,” Welch said. “We have to build it in several locations.”
He said that the construction arrangement was necessary to meet the 18-month deadline required by Gov. Chris Gregoire.
Todd Shipyards will build the hull, he said, while Nichols Brothers Boat Builders, based at Freeland on Whidbey Island, will work on the vessel’s superstructure.
Everett Shipyard will build the vessel layer in between — which is from the car deck up to, and including, the passenger compartment.
Design
For now, Welch said, the focus is on the design.
Guido Perla & Associates is representing Todd Shipyards as its ferry designer, while Elliott Bay Design Group of Seattle is representing the state ferries system in refining plans for the ferry.
Elliott Bay Design Group designed Massachusetts’ Island Home ferry, and the design of the future Port Townsend-Keystone ferry is roughly based on that ferry.
“You’re just talking about hundreds of details, and a lot of consequences if we don’t get right details,” Welch said.
Steilacoom II lease
In a telephone interview Friday, Moseley said he believes an agreement can be reached with the Pierce County, owners of the 50-car Steilacoom II ferry, which will extend the state’s lease of the vessel past August and for the duration of the 64-car ferry’s construction.
“I think that Pierce County understands the situation we’re in and they’ve been very accommodating to date,” Moseley said.
“I think they have been helpful and I think they will continue to be very helpful.”
Pierce County officials contacted last week said they were feeling the absence of the Steilacoom II, which normally backs up sister vessel Christine Anderson on the county’s Steilacoom-Anderson Island-Ketron Island run, but that they were willing to sit down with the state to work out an agreement.
“We’ve experienced a serious amount of maintenance costs on the Christine Anderson, but based on what the state’s situation we would be willing to consider extending the lease,” said Mike Esher, Pierce County airport and ferries administrator.
“The formal response is that there is no predetermined decision of ‘No, we’re not going to renew the lease.'”
The Steilacoom II joined Pierce County’s fleet in January 2007 and that county recently dry-docked the vessel at Todd Shipyards for Coast Guard-required annual maintenance.
The vessel returned to the Port Townsend-Keystone route on Feb. 12 after five weeks in dry dock, and the state contracted an Anacortes passenger-ferry service to serve the route during that time.
Other issues Moseley discussed Friday:
Hood Canal Bridge
• A Port Townsend-Edmond commercial freight truck ferry round trip is locked-in for the six-week closure of the Hood Canal Bridge that will begin on May 1.
The bridge will be closed so that its east side can be replaced.
An estimated 1,700 trucks cross the state Highway 104 Hood Canal Bridge daily, and the ferry service will serve only six 82-foot rigs and up to 86 passenger vehicles each way a night.
No other runs are possible, Moseley said, “because we don’t have the boats.”
Moseley admitted that such mitigation was not enough, but said that it was all the state could do during the closure.
Most traffic, he said, will drive around Hood Canal, using U.S. Highway 101 through Quilcene and Brinnon during closure of up to six weeks, which will replace the bridges east half.
The Issaquah-class ferry will depart Port Townsend at 10:40 p.m. nightly for a 90-minute crossing to Edmonds, where trucks and cars will be picked up and returned to Port Townsend.
• No other passenger ferry service between Port Townsend and Seattle is planned during the bridge closure, as was the case in late 2007 when Moseley’s boss, Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond, pulled the Steel Electric ferries from the Port Townsend Keystone route after the 80-year-old vessels were declared unsafe with pitted and corroded hulls.
Advisory boards
• Reacting to Gov. Chris Gregoire’s proposal to cut 149 separate boards and citizen advisory committees to save state money, Moseley said that ferry advisory committees, including the one in Jefferson County, would not disappear but would take on another form that includes government agencies with elected officials.
“We are to continue having communications with all elected officials, business communities and travelers,” he said.
Moseley said his next trip to the North Olympic Peninsula will be at noon March 9 when he speaks to the Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce luncheon at Fort Worden State Park Commons.
________
Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
