Politics & Government

Your City Council: WETA Says Funding, Dredging Could Sink Hopes for Ferry Terminal

Hercules Patch coverage of the Tuesday, May 22 Hercules City Council meeting.

Hercules will face several serious obstacles in its quest to bring a ferry to town, said John Sindzinski, Manager of Planning for the Water Emergency Transit Authority.

Sindzinski, who spoke at Tuesday's Hercules City Council meeting, said securing funding to build and operate a ferry terminal would be the project's main challenge.

Getting the project started would cost about $17 million, he said, for clearing two miles of soil to make way for the ferries. The dredging would then have to be redone every three or so years afterward. Other costs would include dealing with potentially contaminated dredge soil and buying the multimillion dollar ferries, he said.

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A hovercraft would would allow the city to avoid entirely the dredging dilemma, but the smaller size and noisiness of hovercrafts would create a whole set of problems, separate from the traditional ferries, Sindzinski said.

Sindzinski also said Hercules probably wouldn't have enough regular ferry riders to sustain a terminal in its city limits. He closed his talk with the council with a promise to continue to consider Hercules for a ferry destination.

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The meeting:

7:15 p.m., INTRODUCTIONS/PRESENTATIONS

1) Introductions of participants of the West Contra Costa Unified School District's .

-Hercules High School students Terilyn Chen and Beilul Naizghi will be attending Harvard University and Brown University, respectively, in the fall.Hercules Middle High School Principal Guy Zakrevsky said Ivy League schools especially like Hercules students. "Our students that come out of Hercules are multi-dimensional…and those are the future leaders of our country," he said.

2) Receive a presentation from John Sindzinski, Manager of Planning Water Emergency Transit Authority regarding the Hercules Intermodal Transit Center Project.

-Sindzinski said building a ferry terminal in Hercules would be a difficult, expensive endeaver.

3) Receive a presentation from Charlies Anderson, WestCat General Manager, regarding current and future bus routes.


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