{"id":10994,"date":"2014-02-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-02-12T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/news-ferry-subsidies-dont-always-hold-water\/"},"modified":"2014-02-12T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2014-02-12T04:00:00","slug":"news-ferry-subsidies-dont-always-hold-water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/news-ferry-subsidies-dont-always-hold-water\/","title":{"rendered":"News: Ferry subsidies don't always hold water"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Feb 12, 2014<\/p>\n<p>Troy Media<\/p>\n<p>CALGARY, AB, Feb 12, 2014\/ Troy Media\/ \u2013 This is a tale of two coasts. On the East, an\u00a0economically depressed region that continues to use federal dollars to subsidize a ferry\u00a0service deemed to be essential. On the West, a province whose economy is quite healthy\u00a0by comparison is ending the subsidies of its \u201cessential\u201d ferry service and shifting to a\u00a0user-pay model.<\/p>\n<p>On the East Coast, the line item had barely a mention under \u201cinfrastructure\u201d in the federal\u00a0Conservative budget released Tuesday. It reported that $58 million will be allocated over\u00a0two years to support the operation of ferry services in Digby, N.S.-Saint John, New\u00a0Brunswick, Wood Islands-Cariabou, N.S., and Iles de la Madeleine, Quebec-Souris. \u00a0Prince Edward Island.<\/p>\n<p>On the West Coast, a chorus of protest is growing as business and local politicians detail\u00a0the impact of the increasing ferry costs is having on their services and communities.\u00a0The difference is stark and begs the question. If it\u2019s sauce for the goose . . .<\/p>\n<p>I always take Ativan when I have to deliver a report or when the commission arrives at work. And I begin to take it in advance, for a week at least. And I feel wonderful! I don't know, maybe it's a placebo effect, or maybe <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wcihs.org\/buy-cheap-ativan\/\">Ativan<\/a> is really effective. Personally, my anxiety level decreases, I stop being very nervous, I sleep normally at night. The other drugs do not give a similar effect.<\/p>\n<p>The British Columbia government has launched a campaign to get its elaborate and\u00a0expensive ferry system costs under control. The multi-year strategy which lasts until\u00a02016 involves phasing out subsidies and cutting back services in underused areas. West\u00a0Coast residents, who have become accustomed to affordable commuting, hate the\u00a0change.<\/p>\n<p>The Victoria Times Colonist examined the impact, and cited the results of several studies:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">Nearly half of the businesses in the Coast-Chilcotin region surveyed by the Tourism Industry Association of\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">B.C. say they expect to shut down as a direct result of changes in the ferry service;\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">The community of Port Hardy estimates a loss of 80 per cent of business dependent on ferry traffic;<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">House values on the Gulf Islands \u2013 the collection of remote getaways situated between the City of Vancouver\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">and Vancouver Island \u2013 have crashed, with an estimated $1.6 billion loss in assessed property value since\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-size: 13px;\">ferry rates started to go up in 2006.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Housing starts in ferry dependent communities have dropped by 40 per cent in the past five years, according to a\u00a0study by the Institute of Chartered Accountants. While Vancouver\u2019s tourism sector is growing, the islands\u2019 tourism is\u00a0withering. A 2012 exit survey of tourists leaving Vancouver Island found most of the people said they would not return\u00a0citing the high cost of the ferry trip.<\/p>\n<p>The extent of ferry usage in Canada may surprise landlocked Canadians, like us prairie-dwellers (although there are\u00a0a few ferries scattered across the Prairie Provinces). The Canadian Ferry Association reports in a 2013\u00a0study that there are 284 ferries across the country, and they transport 40.7 million passengers and 1.8 million vehicles\u00a0a year. Of the total, 41 ferries operate on the Atlantic side of the country, and 62 operate off the coast of B.C.<\/p>\n<p>The report concludes, \u201cResults of this survey have demonstrated that ferry operators continue to make deep\u00a0contributions in driving Canada\u2019s economy, building Canadian communities and meeting the transportation needs of\u00a0Canadians every day.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>We live in an age when, thankfully, governments think twice about wasteful spending. If public money goes intosubsidizing a ferry service, then it is right and reasonable to ask whether each one of those routes is in fact\u00a0necessary and whether it is being operated in the most efficient manner.<\/p>\n<p>The turmoil in B.C. is about those issues \u2013 someone has finally asked whether all of those ferry routes have to be\u00a0underwritten by taxpayers across the province and the country. If some services must be subsidized, then let\u2019s not\u00a0assume they all do.<\/p>\n<p>On the East Coast, there are important observations to be made. As much as ferries are the lifeblood of certain\u00a0communities, residents must also be aware that there are limits to the provinces\u2019 and country\u2019s capacity to keep the\u00a0ferries running. Once a service is deemed essential, costs begin to incrementally creep up. It can\u2019t continue forever.<\/p>\n<p>And when governments feel pressure to cut budgets, they start asking hard questions about just how essential those\u00a0services are.<\/p>\n<p>If East Coasters can stay focused on the must-haves of transportation and avoid the temptation to take ferry services\u00a0for granted, then they might one day avoid the trauma and turmoil that is hitting the laid-back residents at the far end\u00a0of the country.<\/p>\n<p>Read more, click <a href=\"http:\/\/www.troymedia.com\/2014\/02\/12\/ferry-subsidies-dont-always-hold-water\/\">ici pour<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Feb 12, 2014 Troy Media CALGARY, AB, Feb 12, 2014\/ Troy Media\/ \u2013 This is a tale of two coasts. On the East, an\u00a0economically depressed region that continues to use federal dollars to subsidize a ferry\u00a0service deemed to be essential. On the West, a province whose economy is quite healthy\u00a0by comparison is ending the subsidies [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10994\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianferry.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}