a ee . a an : : a. oe! ” ZOCAL ferry tales mappear bound for some fmecaliy unhappy endings. m And it is the raxpayers Be ho should be the unhappi- gst with that non-fictional ality. The most recent kick in heir collective teeth came on aNov. 18, when 15 members bf the Office and Technical Employees Union Local 15 mehut down the operations of meam/ancouver Shipyards. This, even though fancouver Shipyards and pther yards involved in fast- merry construction promised a mn0-strike, no-lockout envi- onment. The job action idled 600 SeeVancouver Shipyard workers mand threw yet another mepsrench in the works for the mll-fated and now far o ourse fast ferries progra mconcocted by the provincial ae covernment. Remember Saturday Night Live’s Gilda Radner as Mother Teresa ‘telling the Bewaifs of India to, just for Beonce, “get it together! ”? me. The rest of the province am would be justified in firing the. same line at BC Ferries and the local shipyard indus- fae try. ; : The provincial govern- ment, after all, has been crawling over broken promis- es to deliver sacks of cash to the West Coast’s faltering fm shipbuilding industry to get man this whole fast ferries pro- gram off the beach and into the water, but the recipients of all that largesse-are blow- B ing it at every turn. The program, for e:am- mam pic, is overbudget and behind a schedule. That appears to have been am its lot from the get-go. INJURED IN A. Apart from the most recent rough labor weather, the ferry construction project has run headlong into techni- cal difficulties arising from fabricating ship hulls with aluminum. Welding with that metal is no picnic. Shipyard workers have required full-scale retraining to learn its finer points. Inspections of those welds have also slowed fast ferry progress to a crawl. Delays have become as much a part of the operation as have the promises of what it will achieve on the interna- tional market and how buoy- ant is its future. Originally scheduled to be afloat in the fall of 1996, the first fast ferry now likely won't be in the water until the middle of next year. As recently as Jul tions were that the ferry would be launched in September. A revised December 1997 launch date is now well into the pipe- dream category. : And that is only the first of what is supposed to be three fast-ferry catamarans. All this for a vessel that will, operating under opti- mum conditions, shave per- haps 30 minutes off the Horseshoe Bay-to-Nanaimo ferry run. The initial estimated price » CAR ACCIDENT? Call DEREK A. CAVE Trial Lawyer Get the settlement #508, Kapilano 100 Building 100 Park Royal, West Van. you deserve. 925-7880 DRAPERIES & BLINDS BY S.LAURSEN & SON Another one of our designs. Ask about our Seniors’ discounts. } For Free Estimates Phone 987-2966 Serving the No: ih Shore for 25 yours of each vessel has gone from $70 million to about $75 million. According to Leslic Eiken, a vocal critic of the fast ferry program, the total per-ferry cost could hit $120 million betore the dust has settled. The B.C.-based indepen- dent consulting engineer points out that B.C. Ferries had spent $152 million on the program as of last May. Add in S84 million in labor alone on fast ferries two and three. The first ferry, he figures, faces a labor bill of $21 mil- lion that is not included in the initial $152 million. Tack on all the equip- ment that has yet to be pur- chased for the vessels and you are closing in on “$120 million a piece, if they are lucky,” s: Ziken. He doesn’t expect the first ship to be in service until June or July at the earliest. Add this to the recent labor unrest that threatens to further destabilize confidence in the ability of local ship- yards to deliver the vessels — not only to the BC Ferry Corp. but to any prospective international buyers who might have been considering investing in B.C’s fast-ferry technology — and you have a ferry tale worthy of the Brothers Grimm. Truc, spinoff benefits for the local shipbuilding indus- try include refocusing work- ers in new technologies such as aluminum fabrication and offering hopes that some por- tion of the once dynamic local shipbuilding industry can be saved, but all the refo- cusing and retraining in the world won’t do anyone much good if the industry can’t deliver fast ferries on time aad on budget. here And don’t forget the mess that the B.C. Ferry Corp finds itself ir With the govern: ment tossing it the fast ferries program anchor, the seafaring corp. recently revealed that it Jost close to $77 million dur- ing the 1996-97 fiscal vear. Per- passenger operaung expenses have increased from $14.92 in 1993 to $17.49 in 1997, Salaries alone increased $11.9 million over the previ- ous fiscal year With subsidies from the fisealiv-challenged NDP gov- ernment chopped and capital costs unloaded onto the ferry corporation, it is sink or swim time. . fares have conse- quently just been jacked up as much as $] per passenger and $2 per vehicle on routes berween Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland. The increase represents the second fare hike in eight months. Little wonder that the natives are getting evermore restless. Bowen Islanders, 2 usually reasonable, but occasionally prickly lot, staged a protest over the ferry hikes Nov, 21. They blocked ferry traffic, waved placards and demand- ed a fare hike rollback. Mutiny on the Queen of Howe Sound, Captain Queeg. Islanders see their proper- ty values heading south as the socialists scramble to off-load fiscal mismanagement at every turn. It is full-steam ahead into uncharted waters with Captain Wrongwav Peachfuzz at the wheel. A ship of fools bound for nowhere with a hold full of your hard earned tax dollars. Too bad this ferry tale is not a work of fiction.