[bearcat]

A lot of the Vancouver aquabuses only have 12 passengers, and fares start at $4.25. A lot cheaper if you get a 20-ticket pack or a monthly pass.

That's what I was expecting. Not this.

How often do the aquabuses come? From a quick Google it looks like every 15 minutes at least. I was more pointing out that every 1 hour is not really suitable for a commuter service.

 

[nfitz]

How often do the aquabuses come? From a quick Google it looks like every 15 minutes at least.

More often than that for most stops; I've only waited at the far west, where there's less service - I think every 15 minutes.

Schedule is amazing - better any TTC - except perhaps Line 1 and Line 2.

Yeah, this pilot is a joke, designed to fail.

 

[McGillicuddy]

There is never going to be a Toronto water commuter service except to the Toronto Islands.

Ferries work best when they cut directly across bodies of water (like the Dartmouth Ferry or the Vancouver SeaBus), or when they serve routes that are particularly inconvenient by surface transport. (Like connecting mainland Vancouver to Granville Island.)

In Toronto, none of that materializes at a scale suitable to support a commuter service: instead of cutting directly across a body of water, ferries would have to run laterally along the coastline, often directly parallel to much more efficient methods of surface transportation.

Certainly, there will be summertime demand for touristic trips between Ontario Place and Harbourfront, or whatever, but that's not a commuter service. You're never going to see a SeaBus system, at least not without a level of subsidy that would make your eyes pop out of your head.

Even a service between Ookwemin Minising and downtown... for one thing, it doesn't go downtown: you still need to transfer onward to reach the downtown employment area. And once the Waterfront East LRT comes online, offering a direct trip to downtown in a single seat, demand for a commuter ferry along the route will evaporate.

 

[nfitz]

There is never going to be a Toronto water commuter service except to the Toronto Islands.

Ferries work best when they cut directly across bodies of water (like the Dartmouth Ferry or the Vancouver SeaBus), or when they serve locations that are inconvenient by surface transport. (Like connecting mainland Vancouver to Granville Island.)

In Toronto, none of that materializes at a scale suitable to support a commuter service: instead of cutting directly across a body of water, ferries would have to run laterally along the coastline, often directly parallel to much more efficient methods of surface transportation.

Certainly, there will be summertime demand for touristic trips between Ontario Place and Harbourfront, or whatever, but that's not a commuter service. You're never going to see a SeaBus system, at least not without a level of subsidy that would make your eyes pop out of your head.

Even a service between Ookwemin Minising and downtown... for one thing, it doesn't go downtown: you still need to transfer onward to reach the downtown employment area. And once the Waterfront East LRT comes online, offering a direct trip to downtown in a single seat, demand for a commuter ferry along the route will evaporate.

Agreed.

Though Granville island hasn't been an island (if it ever really was) for well over a century. The aquabuses just treat it as another stop.

It would be interesting to know how much traffic is to the same side of False Creek (which isn't a creek), as there's certainly opportunities to move down the same coast.

 

[Natika33]

Some departing shuttles Saturday evening. It felt like the next one came sooner than 20min later, but I wasn't paying a great deal of attention to the time.