BC Ferries meets twice a year with the Bowen Island Ferry Advisory Committee, which is a sub-committee of BIMTAC, the Transportation Committee. The latest meeting was on November 3. These meetings are intended to be avenues of communication between BCF and the communities it serves. I write as chair of Bowen Island’s FAC to indicate some of the issues discussed.
All six members of the FAC were present plus the newly elected chair of BIMTAC and seven BCF representatives. A representative from MLA Jordan Sturdy’s office also attended part of the meeting. We tackled communications, operations issues, facilities and scheduling.
We started by conveying to BCF that the increased capacity of the Queen of Capilano has made a big difference to many of us: we do not need to get into the line-up so early. This translates into 20 minutes’ more sleep for some commuters.
We then shared with BCF one major concern of the Bowen community, namely, communications: how to find out about ferry delays or special circumstances. Currently, it’s impossible to contact a live person at the HSB terminal for information; the phones are in Victoria and they are only answered during limited hours. BCF replied that they use Twitter, FaceBook and email service notices to get information out. They say that the Twitter feed is updated quickly and often and operates 24/7. Your FAC plans to find out if there is a way to link the BCF Twitter feed or FB page to any Bowen online resources.
We conveyed how ugly and useless the electronic sign by the washrooms is. BCF promises to replace it soon with a newer piece of equipment. Your FAC remains sceptical of the value of that and is pushing for BCF to provide wifi in the Lower Cove area.
We’d thank the Captains for making useful announcements over the public address system, for example, about connections with the 257 bus, and we encouraged them to do this more often.
One particular issue relates to the ‘Possible Wait’ sign at HSB. BCF assured us that the sign is supposed to go on when the ferry is 90% full, i.e. with room for about ten more cars. That doesn’t fit with reported experiences. We will continue to monitor this situation and urge you to contact us if the ‘Possible Wait’ procedure doesn’t seem to be working.
Under operations issues, we brought up the fact that some Bowen drivers do not wish to be marshalled onto the ‘wings’. BCF is emphatic that they do not want to marshall unwilling drivers onto the wings. You need to make this clear to the marshallers, e.g. by a sign in your windshield. Another operations issue is direct transfer between Nanaimo/ Langdale ferries and the Queen of Capilano. Currently, there is no system to handle such transfers, which happen at only the discretion of both captains. Mark Collins, VP Strategic Planning & Community Engagement, reported that BCF is currently piloting a ‘through ferry experience’, an IT system rather like airlines use, but said it will be 24 months before the system is in place. HSB is especially challenging because of the limited space; making a transfer lane for vehicles there will involve reconfiguring the terminal. So don’t hold your breath. For now, BCF emphasised that all such requests should go to the Chief Steward as soon as you board.
We pressed to be involved with plans for the redevelopment of the HSB terminal. Mark Collins reported that a strategic planning process is under way with a budget of some $200 million. BCF realises it will need to work with other transportation agencies, including Translink, and says it will aim to be ‘multi-modal’, that is, they will not only be interested in vehicles but also foot passengers and bikes. They said that BCF is not inherently opposed to foot passenger service. A scenario was floated in which foot passengers might be transported to locations other than HSB. BCF was insistent (and indeed fiercely so at meetings with other FACs in the Strait of Georgia) that communities must lobby their elected representatives about changes in service levels.
On scheduling, we asked how to make a case for the restoration of sailings. We were told bluntly that only government can change the minimum service levels and that BCF is only likely to provide service at a higher level if brings profit or enhanced efficiency. They said that their offer to communities to restore sailings in return for a service fee, paid by the requesting community, had not found any takers. This seems hardly surprising.
We indicated that BIMTAC will soon be surveying the community to identify desired restored or additional sailings and sailings people would be prepared to give up in return, along with other scheduling ideas such as spreading the sailings and standardising the gap on Saturday and Sunday evenings. We pressed BCF to supply the detailed data (sailing by sailing: useful for identifying typical overloads) that would help us understand patterns of use. This data used to be available, but since the 2014 fiscal year the FACs have received nothing, despite making FOI requests. BCF’s response was less than satisfactory: that all their IT people have been put onto a different job, leaving no one able to produce this information. For us, given the shift in patterns since the return of the enlarged Queen of Capilano, it is imperative that we have figures from May 2015 onwards. We will continue to press for this information.
BC announced to us their vehicle fare promotion, which follows on from their passenger fare promotion, which those of us using Experience cards (nearly all of us) found so unimpressive, netting savings of less than $5 per week. The savings for vehicle traffic might be more substantial, but we have to realise that this promotion is part of BCF’s experiments in demand management. They are trying to gauge how much they can influence patterns of use by varying the fares. For a commuting community, I suspect that is very little.
The Bowen FAC meets usually once a month, a week before the monthly BIMTAC meetings, which are in the Muni calendar. We welcome public input to both committees so that we can represent your views as fully and fairly as possible.
Susanna Braund is chair of the Ferry Advisory Committee and vice-chair of BIMTAC.
