Second Summer Surcharge Could Be Added to Ferry Fares - Kitsap Sun

By Ed Friedrich
Wednesday, July 29, 2009

OLYMPIA —

The state Transportation Commission is recommending that ferry travelers pay a second surcharge during the heat of summer.

For years, Washington State Ferries has raised vehicle rates 25 percent during the peak season, from May through mid-October. The transportation commission, after hearing Washington State Ferries’ proposal on July 14 to raise fares 2.5 percent across the board, decided to add a 10 percent super summer surcharge in July and August. Like the peak-season surcharge, it wouldn’t affect customers using frequent-user passes, just tourists and other occasional users. For them, the cost of a cross-Sound ticket for a car and driver would jump from $14.45 to $16 each way. The super surcharge would not apply to walk-on passengers.

The transportation commission will hold public meetings on its proposal, said commissioner Dan O’Neal of Belfair. Dates haven’t been set. Final passage would be at a public hearing on Sept. 8. Changes would take effect on Oct. 11, so the super surcharge would first be imposed in July 2010.

The 2009 Legislature anticipated annual 2.5 percent fare increases when it built the transportation budget. Washington State Ferries followed the lawmakers’ direction and proposed 2.5 percent hikes to the transportation commission, the final authority on fares. The commissioners, however, had a hard time believing WSF’s projections that ridership will increase 2.6 percent in 2010 and 2.5 percent in 2011.

“Recent history shows that’s not the way it’s going,” O’Neal said. “That made us think this 2.5 percent (across-the-board fare increase) is probably not going to make it.”

O’Neal said the Legislature suggested a 2.5 percent increase but didn’t preclude the commission from adding the super summer surcharge.

After losing license-tab revenues in 2000, Washington State Ferries for several years raised fares steeply. Ridership plummeted by 10 percent, said WSF planning director Ray Deardorf. In 2007, it bottomed out and began to grow, only to be hit with service disruptions, high gas prices and the recession. In fiscal year 2008, there was another 2.9 percent loss, and 3.6 percent more during the year that ended on June 30.

With boats being built for the Port Townsend-Keystone route and economic variables showing signs of recovery, WSF is expecting a modest rebound in traffic, Deardorf said.

Ferry system figures project that a super summer surplus would bring in about $1.1 million next summer. It is also expected to scare away about 17,000 riders, but there would be a net revenue gain, Deardorf said.

Walt Elliott, co-chair of the Ferry Advisory Committee executive board, said the group passed a motion against the surtax because it hasn’t gone through a public process. It doesn’t generate enough money to avoid fare increases or supplemental budget help if ridership falls short of projections. And Elliott, of Kingston, says the ferry system, not the commission, is charged with developing pricing strategies. The commission is only responsible for adopting, modifying or rejecting them.

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