Community Corner
State Lawmakers Offer Alternatives to Ferry Rate Hike
Three House representatives who are opposed to doubling the cost of riding two Connecticut River ferries met with the state this week.
Instead of hiking the cost of riding the state ferries from $3 to $6, how about just doubling the walk-on costs alone?
Or how about raising the rates just on weekends and not during the week?
Or what about offsetting the cost of running the ferries by allowing advertising on the premises?
Those are a few of the ideas discussed during a meeting Wednesday between state Department of Transportation Commissioner James Redeker and three lawmakers from the region — state Reps. Prasad Srinivasan, Melissa Ziobron and Marilyn Giuliano.
Those are a few of the ideas discussed during a meeting Wednesday between state Department of Transportation Commissioner James Redeker and three lawmakers from the region — state Reps. Prasad Srinivasan, Melissa Ziobron and Marilyn Giuliano.
Srinivasan represents Glastonbury, Ziobron represents East Haddam and Giuliano represents Lyme, all three towns that rely on two ferry crossings the state operates on the Connecticut River.
Ziobron, who spoke with Patch about the meeting, explained that these ideas above aren’t her own, but rather were suggested to her by constituents as alternatives to a DOT proposal to hike ferry costs from $3 to $6 for cars and $1 to $2 for walk-ons.
The ferry between Rocky Hill and Glastonbury is open from May 1 to Oct. 31 and it saw about 16,000 vehicles use it in the 2012 season. The ferry between Chester and Hadlyme saw some 38,000 vehicles utilize it in 2012, although that operating season is open from April 1 to Nov. 1.
“I think we need to be realistic about our state budget,” Ziobron said. “We haven’t had a fare increase in some time.”
So, the conversation centered on how the state could incrementally increase that fare increase and do it in phasing, rather than just doubling it on July 1, Ziobron said.
“No promises were made to us,” Ziobron said. “We certainly don’t believe such a stark increase and in such a short amount of time is necessarily the best answer. I personally pressed to have that date pushed out a little bit.”
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“I’d like to at least give the commissioner some credit because they had made some significant investment in the ferry, like $500,000 investment in a new motor,” she said.
Despite the meeting, DOT Spokeman Kevin Nursick said the picture is still very clear: the ferries are losing money and they have not seen a fee increase in 10 years.
“The ferries operate at a pretty substantial loss every year,” Nursick said. “The last season we lost about $650,000 operating the two ferries. That’s a little bit more in the red than we’d like to see. We’d at least like to see the ferries closer to breaking even because we’d like to see the ferries continue to run in perpetuity.”
But, Nursick added there could be some flexibility in the plan.
“This is a proposal,” he noted. “So it’s not cut in stone.”
Redeker will be on hand to answer questions from residents during two separate public hearings next week, Nursick said.
The first meeting is on May 20 at the Rocky Hill Community Center. The second is on May 22 at the Chester Meeting House. Both go from 6:30 to 9 p.m. each night.
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