Thursday April 16, 2020 ~ COASTAL BC
~ West Shore Voice News
During the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s additionally evident that we are ‘stranded’ on an island. The overall usage of BC Ferries on the main routes on the Easter weekend (last weekend) was down by a strikingly steep decline of 92% over the previous year.
That figure captures usage of people travelling between Tsawwassen, Swartz Bay, and Nanaimo between Thursday (April 7) and Easter Sunday (April 12).
The sailings operated by BC Ferries had been greatly reduced, with Departure Bay shut down for travellers. The capacity of all ferries was reduced by 50 per cent and the usual extra holiday weekend sailings were not added this year for what is usually one of the busiest weekends for BC Ferries operations (other than Thanksgiving weekend).
According to BC statistics, this past weekend 14,633 people travelled on the main routes this year on Easter weekend, compared to 173,284 in 2019.
The total number of travellers on all routes declined by 88 per cent to 30,794 from 260,935.
Meanwhile, there’s an online questionnaire about the future of ferry services in BC. It was launched pre-COVID for achieving a vision of “20, 30 or 40 years into the future”.
The questionnaire is open to 4 pm tomorrow — Friday April 17 online at https://engage.gov.bc.ca/coastalferries
The questionnaire is pretty lightweight. It asks about your current use of the ferry system, and your expectations. Doesn’t get into specifics about any of the terminals or specific routes.