PORT TOWNSEND — Anticipating the first of two new 64-car ferries coming to the Port Townsend-Keystone route in August, Washington State Ferries is pursuing a vehicle reservation system with new technology to cut traffic congestion.
That reservation system includes an upgrade for the Port Townsend-Keystone route, where a 2008 pilot program showed initial success.
“The Legislature approved almost $6 million for it,” Ray Deardorf, Washington State Ferries planning director, told more than 50 people attending Monday’s Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Port Townsend Elks Lodge.
“The whole impetus of the reservation system is to avoid off-street parking,” such as the overflow area used in the past on Water Street south of the Port Townsend ferry terminal, Deardof said.
Peak traffic times
Vehicle space during peak traffic times is state ferries officials’ greatest concern and creates demand for additional service and larger facilities which the state cannot afford, he said.
State ferries is working with a local advisory group to work out a reservation system that will best serve Port Townsend’s route to Whidbey Island.
Deardorf, who has worked for the ferry system about 20 years, stood in for David Moseley, deputy transportation secretary for state ferries, who was originally scheduled. Moseley was called to the governor’s office and could not make it to Port Townsend.
Deardorf received applause from the audience when he assured them that the first Kwa-di Tabil-class ferry would ply the waters of Admiralty Inlet.
State ferries also is working with North Olympic Peninsula chambers of commerce and visitor centers to create off-peak marketing for the Port Townsend-Keystone ferry route.
The Edmonds-Kingston ferry route schedule will be revised this summer to address that route’s difficulty with keeping a schedule.
“That has been one of our worst on-time performing routes for several years,” Deardorf said.
One of the system’s main priorities for 2011 is to obtain a sustainable funding source to cover a $3.3 billion funding gap over the 22-year planning horizon.
Build more ferries
Such funding would help build more new ferries, he said of the aging 20-ferry fleet.
“We really need to retire the vessels when they are 60 years old, not when they are 80 years old,” Deardorf said, referring to the three Steel Electric ferries that were more than 80 years old when they were pulled for safety reasons from the Port Townsend-Keystone route in November 2007.
The first 64-car ferry, costing $65.5 million, is a step toward replacing the Steel Electric ferries.
Deardorf said that when the first vessel is launched in August, a celebration will include Port Townsend, Coupeville and the tribes.
Kwa-di Tabil means “little boat” in Quileute.
A second 64-car ferry is now under construction by Todd Pacific Shipyards in Seattle. Completion is expected in 2011.
A third vessel in the class is being built for another route in the system.
The cost of both boats is $114 million.
Deardorf said that although the state ferries system is no longer in the passenger ferry business, the agency still views passenger ferry service as “complementary” to car ferries, such as that proposed by the Port of Kingston for Kingston-to-Seattle commuter runs.
He said the Kingston-Edmonds route could be better scheduled to coordinate with the Sounder rail system to Seattle.
________
Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
