PORT TOWNSEND — Establishing a public-private partnership for passenger ferry service between Port Townsend and Seattle is the way to sail because it limits the financial risk to ferry operators on a narrow profit margin.
So said Pete Hanke, co-owner of longtime Port Townsend-based ferry service Puget Sound Express.
While Aqua Express is busy moving foot-passengers between Kingston and Seattle in its first year in business, such operations are “struggling,” Hanke told about 50 people attending Monday’s Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce luncheon.
Consequently, Hanke said, an agreement in which a public agency, such as the Port of Port Townsend, aids a private ferry operation is “one of the best ideas.”
Breaking habits
Hanke said much of the difficulty of providing a successful passenger ferry service is breaking commuters of their daily habits.
“It’s really hard to pull people out of their cars on a daily basis,” he said.
Hanke, whose company has provided whale-watching and ferry services — mainly to the San Juan Islands — since 1981, said private foot-passenger ferry service has not progressed much since the ’80s.
He said Port of Port Townsend Executive Director Larry Crockett recently uncovered historic documentation from the 1920s showing a foot-ferry crossing from Kingston to Seattle cost $2.50, compared to Aqua Express today charging about $5 one way.
Hanke, a member of the chamber’s transportation committee, was joined by chamber General Manager Tim Caldwell, a major North Olympic Peninsula transportation system improvements promoter.
