Remarks on the loss of the Yarmouth ferry service, Trout Point Lodge of Nova Scotia management
Dec 21, 2009
Remarks on the loss of the Yarmouth ferry service, Trout Point Lodge of Nova Scotia management
For immediate release
Kemptville, NS We have watched recent events affecting the transportation routes into the Yarmouth & Acadian Shores region with great interest. Like most everyone, we were shocked by both the suspension of the Starlink Aviation service, and much more so by the complete cancellation of The Cat service. The loss of both links severely impacts our business and our marketing strategy.
In our view–as investors and business people who first came to the area on the Scotia Prince and the Bluenose ferries in 1996–the ferry links–not only with Maine but also New Brunswick–must be viewed as highways, that is as critical transportation infrastructure. This is not simply a question of The Cat being about tourism. At Trout Point, our reliance on business connected to The Cat has dwindled substantially over the past several years, as we have diversified our markets and as the general pattern of tourism visitation in Nova Scotia has also changed. Fortunately, we learned quite awhile ago not to be dependant on Bay Ferries for business. Bay Ferries was never a cooperative partner with a small hotel like Trout Point, preferring to interact with much larger and more generic hotels and tour companies. Our belief was that this strategy was not good for tourism, for the Maritime region, or for Bay Ferries, but that’s the way Bay Ferries planned their business strategy. As time went on, the Scotia Prince was lost and The Cat schedule also changed so that it provided no particular benefit to local accommodation or foodservice operators in the Yarmouth region–timing was such that tourists left the area with much greater rapidity and predictability than 5 or 10 years ago.
We are thus not tied in any way to any particular operator–be it Bay Ferries or Starlink Aviation–but absolutely believe that a solution to carry on traditional links between southwest Nova and the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S. must be found, quickly and rationally. Government must take a more active role. In fact, these links or their absence should not be viewed as a local problem, but as something that affects all of Nova Scotia, tourism as well as other businesses, as well as neighboring provinces.
These are links that have existed for decades and centuries. Obviously The Cat ferry model of service was not sustainable–given the millions of dollars the provincial and federal governments doled out over the past 3-4 years in combination with the high ticket prices charged–but that does not mean that other appropriate solutions cannot be found. Part of the problem was with the ship’s technology and configuration itself–high fuel costs, instability in the water, inability to transport freight trucks, seasonality, servicing 2 U.S. ports, shifting schedules, sudden cancellations of service, etc.
In our opinion, all stakeholders–business, community, federal, and provincial–must take a look at international and inter-provincial links, including the Digby-St. John service and the links between the northeastern U.S. (be it Boston, Portland, or Bar Harbor) and southern Nova Scotia. Seeking sustainable solutions is a necessity. Perhaps rather than doling out millions of dollars, government should take an active management role in providing these critical transportation services to Canadian citizens and foreign visitors.
A reasonable solution to us seems to be a modern, conventional vessel, single-hulled, that could accommodate 18-wheelers as well as tour buses and cars, that could connect Massachusetts or Maine with Yarmouth (or Shelburne), that would operate year-round and offer the kind of vacation experience once provided by the Scotia Prince or its numerous predecessors on the Boston-Yarmouth route in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, i.e. attractive, diversified and scalable. Someone working in marketing for Bay Ferries once told us that the strategy with the Cat was to provide a generic, packaged, limited-choice service oriented to tourists–to be the “McDonald’s” of ferry services–obviously this was not the appropriate strategy and the high-speed catamaran was not the right vessel.
www.troutpoint.com
Charles Leary and Vaughn Perret, Managing Directors
(902) 482-8360
Trout Point Lodge, Relais & Chateaux
www.troutpoint.com
2009 Geotourism Challenge finalist
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