that is cool.

I'm all for it. It's all about taking more cars off the road. That would be a fun trip. Also, it'd be good for when you have relatives or friends visiting from out of town.

YES!!

While it would be fun on nice days, its pretty impractical from a transportation standpoint for anyone who does not live right at Shilshole and while the road down the hill remains closed.

eh, i'd rather have bike lanes across the ballard bridge.

any idea how long it would take to get from shilshole to elliott bay? if <40 mins, it's a win.

Very fun and cool for families and to use when relatives are visiting. I would love to use it. Although, I can't see it being a practical commuting option for people working downtown.

Love the idea, but I'd still have to drive to Shilshole and find a place to park.

Shilshole is a bit far from most of Ballard. Will the county improve bus service to meet up with the ferry, or do they expect most people to drive and ride bicycles?

Cool idea, though Shilshole is kinda far from a lot of Ballard. Might it not work better to have the water taxi run from somewhere on the waterfront along central Ballard (north shore of Salmon Bay) to South Lake Union? Seems like better opportunities to link up with buses / the SLU streetcar; distance covered / transit time would likely be lessened; more traffic might be brought in with thoughtfully timed and placed stops in Fremont, Interbay / Queen Anne, or other neighborhoods along the way. Would be important to use a sufficiently low-profiled boat is used so it can clear all of the bridges in their closed positions.

what about incorporating "The Ducks" into this picture? regular routes through Ballard, then *boom* water taxi from Shilshole to various destinations? i dunno.... but it seems like that's what some folks are looking for/expecting.

Why is the bus not slow enough? Seriously, there's something very wrong when I can bicycle from Crown Hill to Pioneer Square faster than the bus. To be clear, I'm not Lance Armstrong and I don't run red lights or blow stop signs. Despite this, I timed myself for a couple of weeks and on average the "EXPRESS" bus was 5 minutes slower getting me to work. What's wrong with that picture? Now they want to start a new transit system that is even slower? I don't get it. I love the ferry system but I see it more as something for recreational travel rather than a timely means of transportation.

I also question the environmental impact. I suspect that ferry would burn more fuel per passenger than a bus. Plowing large objects through water takes a lot more energy than plowing them through the air.

The city really needs to get it together, bite the bullet and build a streetcar system with dedicated right of way. Even ultra Republican Phoenix now has a streetcar system while passive-aggressive, eco friendly Seattle is having yet another vote on the matter. Am I the only person who finds that a bit odd?

Of course not cyclocross.

Unfortunately, for as liberal this city CLAIMS to be, its all about ME ME ME.

Greater good is not something the Puget Sound region understands.

In a heartbeat!

clyclocross, in almost any situation (speedboats and superfast ferries being possible exceptions) water transport is pound-for-pound more energy efficient than motorized road transport. I'm more familiar with freight transport than with passenger operations but I'd imagine they're similar enough realms, and here's the basic gist of any modal efficiency comparison you'll see out there for freight: the average freight ship or tug-barge is something like 1 to 5 times more fuel efficient than a freight train and upwards of 10 times more fuel efficient than a tractor-trailer. In transferring that kind of relationship (fuel burned per ton of cargo carried per mile of cargo carried, for instance) to a water taxi vs. a bus (fuel burned per passenger carried per mile carried), I'd imagine a lot depends on the speed and hull design of the boat, the kind of congestion/driving conditions that the bus would encounter, and the ridership levels on both vehicles but especially the bus.

Put much more succinctly - it is in fact a lot easier to move a big (floating) object through the water than it is to roll a big object down a road (and it gets a lot harder when hills and stop-and-go traffic are factored in.)

Absolutely! What a great way to actually enjoy the trip from Ballard to downtown.

And cyclocross, it's great you can bike downtown so quickly. Just remember that a bus system is not about one person. Of course it takes a little longer, as it both picks people up and drops them off. It's not just for your convenience, it for the transportation of many. 5 minutes of extra time is pretty negligible, especially if it encourages drivers to switch to public transportation.

I do agree we need an integrated transit system - but I think public transportation of all kinds is a good thing, be it bus, light rail or ferry.

Love the idea, hate the route chosen. Rocky has it right, the route should be departing ship canal ( Ballard Bridge ) and dock in Lake Union. This would allow the population center in Ballard ( Market St ) to walk to the ferry, and would hook up with the all too empty SLUT. Also, the boats would operate in fresh water over salt ( maintenance costs cut in half ) and when it's blowing 30kts at Shilshole and water is breaking across the bow, the ship canal is like a pond. Trust me, the wind / weather can make the ride from Shilshole to Downtown an unpleasent experience.

Yes!!! I would use it all the time as opposed to my car or the bus.

I vote for Rocky's plan too. Shilshole is too removed for regular commuters; a taxi from the Salmon Bay area would be accessible to the core Ballard business district and syncing up with the South Lake Union streetcar/downtown would make all kinds of sense. Hope someone submits all these comments to the powers that be -- great to see such a quick batch of feedback developing here.

Liz,

I actually prefer taking public transit over cycling. Problem is in Seattle it's slow and inefficient compared to public transit in other cities. Express buses that only run every 15-20 minutes isn't exactly convenient. Outside of rush hour many lines only run every 30 minutes which means a simple trip from Ballard to UW can take well over an hour with most of that time spent waiting for buses to arrive. I can see why so many people in this town drive everywhere!

Seattle also seems to be the only city that doesn't bother putting up system maps in their shelters which makes it kind of hard to use. Asking drivers I've learned isn't always a good option since they often don't seem to know what route I'd need to take to get where I'm going. SF, Boston, and NYC all have more extensive networks and yet they all seem to manage to put up maps in their shelters. You can't even see a link to a route map on the Metro homepage!

Then you have the fare structure. In NYC you have a Metro stored value card. In SF you have a single pass good for an entire month. I looked on the King County Metro site and they offer 52 (!) different passes for sale. Again, not exactly making it easy for people to ditch the car.

Fortunately for me Seattle is an easy city to bicycle around thanks to the fairly quiet streets and comparatively nice motorists. I will also say that compared to other cities the buses here are pretty clean and never very crowded even during rush hour.

Unless this thing has jet engines, I wouldn't commute on it. Express buses from central Ballard take 20-30 minutes during peak hours and drop me right in front of my office. To take the ferry, I'd have to make a separate trip to Shilshole and a longer trip from the ferry dock to my office. No way there's a time savings there.

If it's anything like the Elliot Bay Water Taxi, it'll also cost more than a bus trip and will only run a few times during peak hours. I remain unconvinced.

Yes, I would use it. The bus takes forever to get through downtown to get to Ballard. I bet the water taxi would be quicker.

Cyclocross, you've got some good and true points. It's a little funny to me, because I'm a San Francisco native, and when I moved to Seattle I was actually really impressed with Seattle Metro!

I miss the SF underground every day. It's faster than driving across the city any day, even without considering parking time. And SF does have route maps in the bus shelters, but those maps don't have timed schedules. They have a # of buses / time. Like, from 8am to 1pm, 12 buses are running the route. That was not especially helpful to me, freezing in the fog, wondering if I'd missed my bus or not. (Course, this may have changed in the last 5 years).

SF has been working on improving their timing, which is historically abominable. Metro, for me, usually runs like clockwork - my highest priority. And Metro's working on improving things as well. The new express bus lanes on 15th really speed the ride up.

Yup, Metro has very few route maps posted and those seem to be isolated in tourist-centric neighborhoods. And I don't like the individual route maps you have to get - it's a huge waste of paper. But their on-line trip planner is really helpful. It got me around the city when I first moved here.

And the bus pass? :) That was another thing I was excited about when I first moved here - I never rode the bus during peak hours so I got to buy the cheaper pass. Perhaps having so many pass options is actually an incentive for drivers - no worries about spending $68 on a pass when you'll only use $30 worth of it.

I still get frustrated with Metro - the lack of neighborhood connections is my main peeve. Ballard to Capitol Hill by bus? Pshaw! But I think they're actually working on that, specifically targeting Ballard connections to other neighborhoods. So I feel pretty positive about Metro here. But damn, I do miss that underground.

Guess it's all half empty/half full.

Here are some stats to chew on:

Ferry -
The W Seattle crossing takes 12mins. . The distance from Shilshole is at least 3x further ( by water ) than W Seattle. Figure 40min on the water
10 min load/unload
10min bus ride Ballard to Shilshole
10min bus ride waterfront to downtown core ( is the waterfront a destination for anyone? ) . Rough estimate is 1hr 10min start to finish.
Cost from W Seattle is $6.00 roundtrip, figure $8.00 for the Shilshole run

Bus -

Market to downtown is 30min .
Transfer maybe another 5-7min.
Rough estimate 35min
Roundtrip cost is $3.50

Bus is half the cost and half the time.

But KC won't let the facts get in the way of a great opportunity to increase govt and extract more money from tax payers

I'd love to hear if anyone has been contacted by the " Ballard Council appointed " citizen group that is supposed to gauge the citizens interest?

Hopefully not the same people that gauged interest in the SLUT and declared full steam ahead!

We have fools for transit planners in this city.

I like the Salmon Bay to SLU idea, but the SLUT connection is a little tenuous. It only runs every 15 minutes at this point, and it's already pretty full at commute times (reputation for being empty notwithstanding) -- if a boat were unloading 20-30 people onto the trolley, the trolley would get tightly crowded.

Finally some of you are seeing this for what it is...a gimmick.

G-dub has it right - this should be a Ballard Bridge to S lake union connection - to hook up with the SLUT and get more folks from that area over to Ballard close enough to downtown to make it useable by commuters and tourists alike.

Shilshole is way too far away and inconvennt to be used on a regular basis for most folks. I just hope that the lack of passengers on that particular route doesn't kill the idea of getting to the Balalrd are at all - since I think this kind of transportation has alot of potential.

It sounds wonderful! It would depend on the price but I would use it for sure... anything to get more cars off the road!

Kari

I'd have to see the roundtrip costs involved ...

If they're comparable to W Seattle Ferry, it's not worth it to take over the bus because I'd be saving neither time nor money and I suspect none of you would be saving much either.

I live in Sunset Hill so getting to Shilshole wouldn't be too much of a problem but again, I doubt I'd be saving any time over Metro.

KJ (and others), I'd be surprised if the water taxi actually succeeded in replacing car trips. More than likely it will attract existing bus riders and have a negligible effect on car traffic.

Love the Bridge/Lake Union idea, but the lack of parking in both areas makes it impractical. As Duncan wisely points out, this service will pull bus commuters, not drivers and have little if any effect on auto traffic volume.

To get people to leave behind their cars you have to have a solution that is both 1)inexpensive and 2) takes equal or less time than driving. Metro can't offer #2 at this time, nor likely ever will.

Metro is very convienent for traveling to/from Downtown and to a lesser extent from Downtown to Bellevue core, but as far as neighborhood to neighborhood driving will always be the more practical option virtually any day or time.

I would totally take this ferry! I find the smell of fresh puget sound air much more enjoyable than the urine and BO smell that seems to permeate from the busses.

Wow, I would totally use it. the only problem is it is kinda a ways to get to if you dont drive. it should leave from the locks.
but still, one of the best ideas ever!

Oh hell yes! Anything to get off the sardine-crammed commuter buses.

Shilshole as a starting point doesn't seem like a spot that will service too many people. It might be a good place to bring visitors (tourists) but I can't see anyone doing this as a daily commute.

Don't overlook the tourist value.

In the Kenmore meeting we emphasized the need to measure (profile) ridership ....... commuter, local pleasure, and non-local tourist.