In yet another twist to this ferry tale, San Francisco’s other daily tour boat operator offered to take over the contract more or less “as is” with the city of Alameda. In a series of letters to both acting Mayor Al Dewitt and the Manager of Ferry Services, Red & White Fleet President Thomas C. Escher offered to explore ways to save between $50,000 and $100,000 under the existing contract.
Published: November, 2002
In yet another twist to this ferry tale, San Francisco’s other daily tour boat operator offered to take over the contract more or less “as is” with the city of Alameda. In a series of letters to both acting Mayor Al Dewitt and the Manager of Ferry Services, Red & White Fleet President Thomas C. Escher offered to explore ways to save between $50,000 and $100,000 under the existing contract.
However, apparently a scheduled meeting with the ferry manager was inexplicably cancelled by the city. While Red & White Fleet does not have backup vessels sufficiently fast to operate the current schedule, they do have a fleet of three dependable tour vessels. In the beginning of Blue & Gold’s operation and continuing for almost five years, the Alameda Oakland Ferry saw passenger growth each year with a service that consisted of only three slow tour boats, and one relatively unreliable high-speed vessel.
So, it is apparently a question of planning and intelligently applying resources to the operation. At this time, however, Alameda owns two high-speed vessels assigned to the Alameda Oakland run and also two others assigned to the Harbor Bay run. The second Harbor Bay vessel, the poorly named HARBOR BAY EXPRESS II ALAMEDA, is due out of the repair shop and could conceivably be used as a back up by both services.
If so, then the back up by tour vessels would only be needed in an unusual event, where all three high speed vessels would be out of service at the same time. In any event, it now appears that if there is no agreement with Blue & Gold, another operator is waiting in the wings. All of this is good news for the beleaguered riders of the Alameda Oakland Ferry.
