Showers, Sinks Overflow Into Galley Of New BC Ferry

As the ferry system expanded and started to service other small coastal communities, BC Ferries built more vessels in BC shipyards, many of them in the first five years of its operations, to keep up with the demand, including the two large ships - Spirit of British Columbia and Spirit of Vancouver Island. Another method of satisfying increasing demand for service was BC Ferries' unique "stretch and lift" program, involving seven vessels being cut in half and extended, and five of those vessels later cut in half again and elevated, to increase their passenger and vehicle-carrying capacities. The vast majority of the vessels in the fleet were built in B.C. waters, with only two foreign purchases and one domestic purchase. In the mid 1980s, BC Ferries took over the operations of the saltwater branch of the B.C. Ministry of Transportation and Highways, which ran ferry services to very small coastal communities. This action dramatically increased the size of BC Ferries' fleet and its geographical service area. At its inception, BC Ferries was a division of the British Columbia Toll Highways and Bridges Authority, a provincial Crown corporation. Through successive reorganizations, it evolved into the British Columbia Ferry Authority, and then the British Columbia Ferry Corporation, both of which, again, were provincial Crown corporations. In 2003, Gordon Campbell's B.C. Government announced that BC Ferries, which had been in debt, was going to be reorganized into a private company. This was established through the passing of the Coastal Ferry Act (Bill 18-2003). The single voting share is held by the BC Ferry Authority, which operates under the rules of the Act. A controversy began in July, 2004 when BC Ferries, under a new American CEO, announced that the company had disqualified all Canadian bids to build three new Super-C class ships, and only the proposals from European shipyards were being considered. The contract is estimated at less than $500 million for the three ships, which are each designed to carry 370 vehicles and 1600 passengers. The argument for domestic construction of the ferries is that it would employ numerous British Columbia workers, would revitalize the sagging B.C. shipbuilding industry, and entitle the provincial government to a large portion of the cost in the form of taxes. Despite strong public protests, the Campbell government went ahead and placed its orders with a German shipyard (the 3 large PacifiCats, now moored in North Vancouver, weren't considered). When the Queen of the North sank last year, a replacement vessel was also purchased overseas. British Columbians who recall the media surrounding the NDP building of the PacifiCats, can only roll their eyes thinking what CanWest news media would have said about the disasters if "Northern Adventure" had been an NDP ship. Here is a description of its first day of service with B.C. Ferries, sweetly reported in the Times Colonist as follows: Northern ferry arrives in Port Hardy without incident after 30-hour delay Judith Lavoie Times Colonist Sunday, April 08, 2007 http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/story.html?id=b2a07ce7-a8a6-4e4b-abb7-2b8ee244024c&k=96962 [Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on April 10, 2007]

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