Downtown water taxi service suspended?

[thelakelander]

The water taxis that ferry travelers between the North and South banks could cease operations until after this spring.

full article: http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/blog/morning-edition/2013/01/downtown-water-taxis-could-be-docked.html

[strider]

Another loss for Jax Downtown.  Not enough ridership to justify it to the company I guess and so with operating cost (fuel, wages and insurance) going up, probably tough to show a profit. Odd that they renewed THEN made this decision.  Perhaps some personal reason rather the financial?  If it is financial, can the city actually get another company to even do it? Is it subsidized in some way?

In places like Annapolis, MD, the inner harbor has transient moorings and one of the big water taxi business generators is the people coming off the moored yachts. You call the taxi and they come and take you to town.  Much easier than using your dingy in evening clothes (not that I ever wore evening clothes coming off a boat!) .   Our downtown river area is way to small for moorings and the few docks are old (no, almost ancient) and the price at River City is a bit high for their condition. (Though dealing with the dock master,Lee ,at least last time I was there, is a joy. ) The city wall side tie ups are a bit too public and too accessable for many.   Then, add in the worst current on the river and you have a boating issue with downtown.

If you go between the bridges, then there are possibilities.  The current, due to the river's increased width, is a bit better to deal with, there is more space and there is still the needed depth.  Of course, the land is (I think) all privately owned.  We put into the St Joe dock once due to an emergency and worried about being thrown off (threatening signs).  The hospital has a great area, but then it is a hopsital.  As I had a good friend who used to look out at the sailboats and have them cheer his spirits while undergoing chemo, we regularly sail as close as possible to the breakwall there and further up the river at St Vincents. (OK, so we MAY be scaring some too!)

I guess I am just using this thread as an excuse to lament about how badly Jax uses it's great river asset and how much better it could be done.

[blizz01]

Can you (or have you ever been able to ) take the water taxi to the zoo from a downtown location?  Would that even be a realistic possibility?

[Ocklawaha]

Another part of a well balanced multi-modal transit system.

The idea of a Zoo or Ortega River Marina stop might work if it was launched with a large joint advertising campaign and some incentives to use the boat to the zoo. Ortega River Marina district might work too if you could connect dots with it:

Jacksonville Landing
Riverside Arts Market (weekends or on call only)
Memorial Park
St. Vincents
Rivera Parkway Pier
Willow Branch
Edgewood (Might be parking issues with Avondale)
Ortega River Canal

Going north you'd have to come up with a string of stops M/L equal. For either of these to be successful I think you need a different type of craft. Forget high speed commuter service and aim for a steady daily round trip, north then south, as it fills up add another set of round trips. Something that is small enough for economy and large enough for parties. The Lady Chadwick II down in Captiva is what I'd visualize.

Jacksonville Landing
Friendship Park
Crown Plaza
Chart House
Shipyards 600' foot PUBLIC PIER
Metropolitan Park
Exchange Island
Jones College
Arlington Marina
JU Marine Science
Arlington Lions Club Park
Trout River Marina
Jacksonville Zoo

...And yes I know the wharves or canals would have to be altered to fit the boat, and the zoo pier might need to be extended  a quarter mile to get out of the mud... Schedules, JTA, etc... I know... I know...

[thelakelander]

That's a lot of gas for half empty taxi service from Ortega to the zoo.  Things like this, horse carriages, pedicaps, etc. work better when you already have a decent amount of pedestrian traffic.  I don't see a river taxi service being remotely viable anytime soon without some form of incentives or PP3.

[Ocklawaha]

Which is why I said it would need a large joint advertising campaign, various agreements and probably a grant, 501c3, heritage group, famous chef (stephen your up to bat LOL) etc. 

I wouldn't be so quick to discount the idea that downtown Jacksonville, the zoo, and our waterfront couldn't support it. Sanford has had 'The Star of Sanford,' 'The Rivership Romance' etc... since at least 1985 and they pack them in. Yes it is a dinner cruise, but then this could be too. I just think once you go beyond a back and forth shuttle you need to offer more reasons to spend an hour and a half getting to the zoo and back. A real tour boat (and not the glorified barge we have downtown now) would do the trick. Toss in the maritime folks and the Adams and things would probably fall into place. The biggest drawback would be to get someone or some group to pull the trigger.

[thelakelander]

So you're just talking about a dinner cruise or a duck tour and not a water taxi?

A water taxi would need more than advertising and a large weekend crowd.  I'm sure S.S. Marine would have loved to do operate a water taxi service between these points if it were truly feasible.  However, such a service would need a market that puts constant paying butts in the seats to cover the operational costs while turning a profit for the investor....or a continuous flow of money from taxpayers.  It would need the type of market that doesn't exist in downtown Jax and won't exist anytime soon, assuming we continue the slow incremental process of revitalization we've grown accustomed to over the years.

[peestandingup]

This is dumb. I've always said they should make a water taxi part of JTA so it can be subsidized & tied in to the greater network instead of relying on some 3rd party company to do it for their inflated prices, which are able to just suspend service on a whim. I've taken the taxi a few times, but put a couple of family members on it & its just too expensive to use for any real mode of public transit & is more like a pleasure cruise than anything else.

In a downtown who's urban neighborhoods are completely SURROUNDED by water, this seems like a no brainer.