Quote:
Originally Posted by bvpcvm
Here are the reasons I think this is ridiculous:
* The dock at Cathedral Park is basically the middle of nowhere. There's nothing there except the park and some residential. The center of St Johns, which also happens to have the nearest transit stop, is a 10-minute walk. So instead of 25 minutes, we're up to 35, and that's if we ignore time waiting for the ferry. If you missed the ferry, you've got another 10 minute walk back to a bus stop or you can wait for the next one. That 10-minute walk is half a mile (all per Google), and even TriMet doesn't expect anyone to walk more than 1/4 mile to their transit stops. Yes, roll your eyes -- I too regularly walk more than 10 minutes to the grocery store. But most people don't walk that much, and if we're talking commuting, we're asking people to make that walk every day in often shitty weather. Not happening, not when a large number of people living in central St Johns can walk out the front door of their house and be at a bus stop much more quickly than they could get to this dock.
* We have existing transit that covers this route and also stops at other places along the way. What is the use case for the ferry? It won't be faster, it won't be more convenient, and, correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't boat motors more polluting than buses?
* RiverPlace is I guess a reasonable landing spot (where else in DT?), but let's say your destination is Pioneer Square - that's 0.8 miles, or 15 minutes on foot. Now we're up to 50 minutes.
* Compare that with driving and transit: driving is 16 minutes and existing transit is 44 minutes.
* Portland unfortunately is a city with an underutilized waterfront (how many waterfront restaurants can you name?). Yes, people walk and bike along the waterfront but if you're commuting that's not where you're headed. If it were already activated this might work, but, seriously, an occasional ferry isn't going to do that, and until it IS activated, the ferry will underperform.
* Ferries in Seattle make sense because of their geography - the alternatives are untenable.
I know, I know, I sound like an old man who hates new ideas. But transit that goes from where people are to where they want to go works well. In some crazy world where we built a canal directly to central St Johns and launched the ferry from there this could make some sense, but that's an unredeemably silly idea. Buses work. MAX/Streetcar works. I'd rather see the money spent on those transit modes.
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A few issues I have with this, a 10 minute walk is not a big deal, it takes me about that much time at least if the lights are in my favor to walk to the light rail stop near me. Plus how many people walk to Cathedral Park in St Johns? I can't imagine people in that neighborhood not going there because a short walk is too far.
Another issue I have is with the timing. Anyone who takes transit of any kind pays attention to the schedules and timing. If someone is just walking down to the ferry to ride it downtown and isn't paying attention to the timing, then they probably aren't worried about how long it will take them because the idea of commuting on the river over taking a bus through the city sounds more enjoyable. I remember my commutes from Jersey to Manhattan, when taking the ferry was the option, we always took it because it was more enjoyable than taking the PATH, even though the PATH was faster.
As for there being other similar routes, none of these routes run along the river with less stops. Plus, by bus it would take about an hour to get from St Johns to Riverplace, so a 35 minute ferry ride sounds like an obvious choice. If your destination is near Pioneer Courthouse Square and you are wanting to get their faster without having to walk from Riverplace, then the bus is the obvious choice, if the few extra minutes isn't an issue, then maybe the ferry is the better option. With those that say they can drive that in 15 minutes, that is why traffic exists and those people are going to choose sitting in traffic over taking any form of transit any day of the week.
Adding in ferry services would make these river stops more enticing to redevelop for more riverfront focused developments. Though other stops along the river does have closer river access if this pilot program got expanded. Vancouver Waterfront, Rose Quarter, Downtown Portland, OMSI, Downtown Milwaukie, Lake Oswego, Downtown Oregon City. If a MLB stadium is actually built along the river, that would be another riverfront stop. There is a lot of potential to this to simply write it off.
Plus the biggest factor is taking a ride down the river, that isn't something your average person can just do in Portland without having to either own a boat, know someone who owns a boat, do a boat event, or buy a kayak. Paying a few bucks to hop on a ferry to get downtown is going to be enticing to some people that prefer that over taking the bus or driving.
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