TIDE Turning For Clyde Ferry Route
A GREENOCK firm looks set to lose a Clyde ferry route it has run for years as transport officials recommend that a contract for a reduced service with a smaller boat is awarded to a new operator.
Clyde Marine Motoring’s contract to provide the Gourock to Kilcreggan and Helensburgh service – for which it uses the ferry Seabus, pictured -- runs out on 1 April.
Strathclyde Partnership For Transport’s Operations Committee will decide on Friday what will happen to the route.
A report to the committee states that most of the passengers are workers from the Faslane and Coulport navy bases travelling mainly Monday to Friday. The service has low passenger numbers on Sundays and on the Helensburgh sailings.
Operators were invited to bid for the route on the basis that Helensburgh would no longer be served and that there would be a Monday to Saturday service form Gourock to Kilcreggan. The seating capacity of the vessel to be used was reduced from 90 to 60 because surveys showed the ferry had carried a maximum of 48 passengers at any one time.
The committee is being recommended to accept the lowest bid which came from Clydelink Ltd for around £175,000 a year. Clydelink, who provide the Renfrew to Yoker ferry service, would order a new 60-seat craft for the contract.
Photos of Seabus's predecessor on the route, Kenilworth
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