The Cross Bay Ferry could be back by popular demand.
After a six-month trial that ended last year, the City of St. Petersburg did some number crunching and discovered the ferry had a lot of fans in the Tampa Bay area.
“We had a lot of ridership and that was over 40,000 people,” said Evan Mory, the Director of Transportation and Parking.
According to Mory, 90 percent of those who used the ferry were from Tampa Bay.
“We’re all about options for people to get around. We have bridges that are backed up. This provides a consistent time frame to get from downtown to downtown, without having to fight traffic,” said Mory.
Tom Paradise drove over the busy Howard Frankland bridge from Tampa to go to a Rays’ game Thursday night and believes the Bay area needs a ferry.
“One of the problems that is happening here is that we need more mass transit. I think between here and Tampa going forward if you look it 5, 10, 15 years from now, they need to start doing something,” Paradise said.
If the city’s plans are approved, officials said the ferry would run for another six months starting in November.
City officials want St. Petersburg and their county partners to chip in once again.
“Council signaled their support for this and allocating $150,000 for it, but we still have to get our partner governments on board, the other three governments entities. Tampa, Hillsborough County, Pinellas County,” said Mory.
Florida Department of Transportation has agreed to give the city more than $400,000 to help fund the project, which would cover some of the cost over a three-year span.
