High Speed Ferry Service from Luna Pier MI, USA

I am a Councilman for the City of Luna Pier, MI. I am also the major property owner looking to develop about 50% of our downtown area that is immediately adjacent to our main harbor and city park. Our City has a Master Plan that includes tourism with our city as a hub for ferry service to lake Erie islands as well as a stop between Detroit and Toledo. We are immediately off of Interstate 75 and the closest exit to the lake. $750,000 was just spent on our harbor improvements this summer. We have been approached by interested ferry boat investors in the past but due to the harbor depths (sometimes only 3 feet deep) we have had to look at dredging or hovercraft type boats which are both not cost effective. Is there a larger high speed pontoon boat or another option that might work in our sometimes shallow harbor? We are also looking for investors and operators interested in partnering with us. We can send out an investment summary pdf or also check out our city web site at www.cityoflunapier.com
Mike/Councilman

 

Mike

There are 2 basic tasks that must be completed before you get to a ferry service.

1) The operator must do a proper and through route planning analysis. They must look at the whole route, from berthing to disembarking to the route itself, for hazards, shallow water, residence on or near the water, especially if shallow, noise requirements, pollution requirements all the way to general availability for maintenance.

and then

2) To establish an SOR, that is a Statement of Requirements. This SOR is ostensibly a "wish list" that the operator would like with the boat. For example, service speed, maximum length, maximum draft, number of passengers, baggage allowance, cargo, etc etc.

Once the above is completed, you can then either submit direct to a naval architect of your own choice or put this out for tender.

The naval architect from the items in #1 and #2, shall determine the best option you have available and recommend a design that satisfies the SOR, which is based upon #1.

If you approach this from the outset assuming a type of design, in this case a pontoon type hull, then you will probably not get the most suitable vessel for the route.

The weblink does not, well i couldn't find, any reference to items #1 or #2.

Buying a passenger boat is not like buying a car for your family, when you decide you need a bigger car. It's more like buying a bus, what size (how many poeple), will it fit down the narrow streets, are there one-way routes, is there a petrol station near by what about a garage, where can we stop the bus, do we have permits to stop at XX or YY etc etc. It appears on first impressions, you're putting the cart before the horse, so to speak!

Finally, I should add. If shallow water is a concern then there are many vessels that can run in shallow water. We have previously designed a large catamaran that runs in just 2.0m water depth. It is not the depth, per se, but the wash. There is a lot of misinformation about wash, which generally ends up restricting the operator to run their ferry at slow speed.

If your required speed is slow, then this may not be a problem. But if you want a decent service speed then this may haunt you. The problem is that wash is not necessarily "just" speed related and their amplitude is not the governing factor, it’s the amount of energy in the wave. Also when comparing fast ferries to conventional ferries a conventional ferry/vessel can exhibit more wash in certain conditions too. Thus is shallow water and principally wash a concern, if so, then you better acquire someone who can do the route analysis who understands this and can placate any fears immediately, by science, not personal subjective feelings; as in the case of the Big Cats over the coast of BC a few years ago.

 

Luna Pier MI - Ferry

Thank You. I can certainly e-mail you a brochure with more info that was just presented to some oversea investors if you send me your e-mail. Also, we have been in talks with a very interested local Michigan investor that approached our city this past year but the idea stalled out when we ran into the dredging issues... hence if we could only solve the shallow water problem with the correct boat. This most recent local investor had researched sending ferry service to Cedar Point amusement park from Luna Pier and they projected a passenger volume that was quite high although I'm not sure how many passengers per boat. Or maybe it's better to use several smaller boats... not sure. We have also been in talks with at least 3-4 local, high volume ferry and tour operators that are all interested (they are listed in the brochure that I can e-mail you as they have attended our city held conference); we just need to get one of those or the potential investors to take the lead on this.

 

Mike

Just sent you my email details.

If you also require someone who is local (US based) who can give you a very thorough route analysis, I can recommend someone too.

 

Just sent you an e-mail. Look at the section in the brochure on the Western Lake Erie Waterfront Conference we held at city hall regarding ferry service. This ended on a very positive note but stalled out later on the dredging issue.
Thanks Mike

 

Hello Mike, I sent you an e-mail regarding this article.

Alaska borough wants to give away expensive ferry
By DAN JOLING | Associated Press – 19 hrs ago
http://news.yahoo.com/alaska-borough-wants-away-expensive-ferry-222717872.html

 

Mike,

If you are truly interested in perusing this project I would advise you to get in contact with Chris Mckesson a Naval Architect with 30 years industry experience, and current professor at the University of New Orleans. Many of his projects involved developing craft that conformed to unusual design constraints.

His web-site is below.

http://mckesson.us/

-Matt

 

Impressive SES (Surface Effect Ship) experience.