SEATTLE – Puget Sound shipbuilders, state lawmakers and state officials gathered on Monday to discuss how best to quickly replace the 80-year old Steel Electric ferries that no longer serve the Port Townsend-Keystone route.
Washington State Ferries design consultant Andy Bennett said at the meeting in the state ferries system’s conference room near the Space Needle that the cost of building new ferries and renovation are about equal.
“It kind of comes down to a wash,” Bennett said at the meeting that drew from 50 to 75 people.
Bennett said that either option would run about $34 million per boat.
Matt Nichols of Nichols Brothers Boat Builders Inc. on Whidbey Island told state ferry officials that, within a year, they could have a new car-carrying vessel plying the Port Townsend-Keystone route, replacing 80-year-old ferries pulled from service last week due to safety concerns.
Nichols suggested that the state use the same design that Nichols used to build the 54-car, 325-passenger MV Steilacoom for Pierce County.
He said it would cost about $20 million for each boat if two or three boats were built.
State Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond said that she was intrigued by the possibility that the state ferries system could test the Pierce County ferry, to give officials a model.
“The question is, does it serve our needs?” Hammond asked after the meeting.
“I think we’re making progress if we could do some kind of fast-tracking notion,” Hammond said.
Hammond met with state Reps. Lynn Kessler, D-Hoquiam – who represents the 24th District which includes Jefferson and Clallam counties – and Barbara Bailey, R-Oak Harbor, as well as Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano Island, and executives of Todd Pacific Shipyards of Seattle, J.M. Martinac Shipbuilding Corp. of Tacoma, and Nichols to discuss a fast track solution.
She said the state ferries system would need some help from the state Legislature in January, possibly by way of a “procurement mechanism.”
“The biggest issue is the value of time, and time is what drives the decision,” Hammond said.
At the time the boats were pulled from service, only the Klickitat and the Illahee were actually running. The Quinault was taken out of service in July for repairs, and the Nisqually in September for inspection.
Knowing that the Steel Electrics are running out of life, Hammond said, ferries officials now understand that the ferries must be replaced quickly instead of “striving for the perfect boat.”
Bailey said, “I like the idea that we can get a boat in a short period of time. We need to come together to do what we can do legislatively.”
John Boylston, with the Cedar River Group – financial consultants for the state ferries system – said that swapping the superstructures for new hulls could be done two at a time, with delivery for sea trials by November 2009.
But, Boylston said that 1927 steel is inferior to steel produced in 2007, and so the existing steel electric hulls would just continue to crack over time.
Steve Welch, Todd Pacific Shipyards’ chief executive officer, told ferries officials that new boats would be a better idea than renovating the existing boats with new hulls.
Bennett said that swapping superstructures for new hulls would work, but that the costs escalate when building new passenger decks and staircases to meet today’s accessibility and Coast Guar standards.
The state ferries system has narrowed the list of design options to 10, Bennett said, with capacity for 60, 80 or 100 cars.
The meeting ended at about 5:30 p.m. with the announcement that 30-knot winds had stopped passenger ferry service between Port Townsend and Keystone, which began Sunday .
The nimble fast ferry catamaran Snohomish has been placed on the run to take commuters across Admiralty Inlet while ferry officials work out the future of the route.
