Ferry Pier 11 - Marine Air Terminal by midyear
Joel Rubin
New Ferry Line to La Guardia Is to Begin Service by Midyear
By PATRICK McGEEHAN
Published: January 8, 2005
Despite the financial troubles other ferry services have had, the
company that takes tourists to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island
plans to start running passenger boats from Manhattan to La Guardia
Airport by midyear.
Circle Line Harbor Cruises intends to start running high-speed ferries
every 30 minutes on weekdays from Pier 11 in Lower Manhattan to 34th
Street and then to a dock near the Marine Air Terminal at the airport,
J. B. Meyer, the president of the company, said. The trip would take
30 minutes and cost $25 each way, Mr. Meyer said.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey chose the company, which
is not affiliated with the operator of Circle Line sightseeing cruises
around Manhattan, in December. Among the other bidders was New York
Waterway, which has been struggling to keep its Hudson River commuter
service operating.
Establishing ferry service from downtown to New York's airports has
been a pet project of Gov. George E. Pataki, said Steve Coleman, a
spokesman for the Port Authority. He said the agency was seeking
proposals from companies that would run a similar service to Kennedy
International Airport starting in 2006.
The governor has been an ardent advocate of linking Lower Manhattan to
Kennedy by building a rail line that would connect to the Long Island
Rail Road. But that project, if it happens, will take about a decade
to complete. In the meantime, ferries would provide the only new route
to the airports.
Circle Line would not be the first to offer business travelers an
alternative to taxicabs as a way to get from the Wall Street area to
La Guardia. Delta Air Lines provided a similar service, which was
operated in its later years by New York Waterway, until the end of
2000, when the service closed.
The Port Authority thought there was enough demand in the late 1990's
that it gave New York Waterway permission to start a second ferry to
La Guardia, this one to another section of the airport. The Port
Authority even budgeted $35 million in 1997 to dredge the bay north of
the airport and build another terminal. But the authority dropped the
plan. New York Waterway, which carries about 30,000 passengers a day
from New Jersey to Manhattan, has fallen deep into debt and is trying
to reorganize its operations. Its owners, the Imperatore family, are
trying to work out a deal with a Manhattan lawyer, William B. Wachtel,
to divide the company's routes, but the Port Authority and the federal
Maritime Administration have not yet approved that plan.
Mr. Meyer said he hoped to enlist the help of Delta and several other
airlines in promoting the airport ferry service. Circle Line's boats
would land at a dock the company plans to build near the Marine Air
Terminal, which is home to the Delta Shuttle. Travelers flying on
other airlines would have to board an airport shuttle bus to reach
other terminals at the airport.
Mr. Meyer estimated that the service would carry 400 to 500 passengers
a day in its first year, about double the number who rode the Delta
Water Shuttle. He said that he had begun talking to some of the larger
employers downtown about supporting the service and that corporations
and groups could receive discounts of about 20 percent of the regular
fare.
"The biggest factor is you know how long it's going to take you," Mr.
Meyer said. "If you take a cab into Midtown, you don't know how long
it could take and it could cost you $35."
Mr. Meyer emphasized that his company would receive no subsidies from
the government. Indeed, he said, it would compensate the Port
Authority for use of the airport dock by sharing some of its revenue
with the agency.
"This is one more mode of transportation that will take pressure off
the highways and help to rebuild the economy of Lower Manhattan," Mr.
Meyer said. "I think that's why the governor has wanted this kind of
service."