Final Report: Options for the Ferry Services Between Gourock and Dunoon

4. ROUTE OPERATIONS

4.1 The Routes

A section of CalMac's routes in the west of Scotland is shown in Figure 4.1 below. Figure 4.2 shows the relative locations of the CalMac's and Western Ferries' services between Gourock and Dunoon.

Figure 4.1 CalMac's Routes

Source: CalMac brochure

Figure 4.2 shows the relative locations of the CalMac and Western Ferries' service.

Figure 4.2 CalMac's and Western Ferries' Routes

Source: Westem Ferries' published timetable

4.1.1 Gourock/Dunoon and Hunter's Quay/McInroy's Point

The Gourock/Dunoon route run by CalMac links the centres of the two towns and connects with a rail head at Gourock, which provides a direct rail service into Glasgow. As a consequence, it is attractive to, and primarily used by, foot passengers, who account for half of the CalMac traffic.

The piers for the Western Ferries service are McInroy's Point and Hunters' Quay, and are within the town limits of Gourock and Dunoon, but not at the town centres. The out-of-town location arguably makes this route more appropriate for the vehicles which constitute its primary source of demand, since traffic congestion is less of a problem. However, Argyll and Bute Council considers that tourist traffic landing at Dunoon, rather than Hunter's Quay, is essential to the economic health of the town and considers any potential traffic congestion as a lesser problem. Turning to Gourock, traffic coming from Glasgow must travel through Gourock to reach McInroy's Point, which is approximately two miles further away, so if cars use McInroy's Point rather than Gourock, this probably increases the flow of traffic through the centre of Gourock. The general practice on ferry services is to take the shortest possible route to achieve the lowest possible fuel and other running costs. This would be McInroy's Point/Hunter's Quay which. at two nautical miles, is half the length of the Gourock/Dunoon route. Gourock/Dunoon, on the other hand, links two town centres and, therefore, offers the possibility of encouraging non-car travel.

The crossing is scheduled to take twenty minutes for both services, although in practice the Western Ferries service takes slightly less.

The road distance between Dunoon and Glasgow, a common destination of travellers on these services, is 75 miles. To reach Dunoon from Gourock by road rather than by ferry adds about an hour to the journey, and potentially two and a half hours in heavy summer traffic.

Both services have a core demand from business traffic on weekdays, although this is augmented by leisure travellers and tourists, particularly at the weekend during the summer. The closure of the American naval base at Holy Loch several years ago led to the release of cheap housing formerly used by servicemen onto the market, which helped to stimulate the growth of commuter traffic on both services.

4.1.2 Wemyss Bay/Rothesay route

The Wemyss Bay/Rothesay route is operated by CalMac alone. It is driven to a much greater extent by tourism than the Gourock/Dunoon route. It benefits from a rail head at the ferry terminal at Wemyss Bay which makes the crossing ideal for foot passengers going on a day trip to the island of Bute. The crossing takes half an hour.

4.1.3 A Single Route?

It could be inferred from the description of the services above that there is considerable duplication in the provision of ferry services between Gourock and Dunoon. In principle, the costs of service delivery between Gourock and Dunoon could be reduced if there was a single crossing between two terminals However, the following practical constraints to a "single route" solution should be borne in mind:

• each company operates a different docking system, so the piers used by the two operators are not readily interchangeable;
• the working arrangements of the two companies are different. CalMac operates with three pier hands at Gourock, and one office staff member per shift in Gourock, together with one office person at Dunoon, while Western Ferries operates with one pier hand per pier per shift. Argyll and Bute Council operates with four staff per shift at Dunoon. While rationalisation and harmonisation of working arrangements is not impossible, it would require consultation with all the affected parties;
• if a port has received the benefit of public money, it is deemed to be a "common user" pier, open to any vessel as long as it pays the relevant charges. This is subject to availability at the pier and the level of charges set by the pier owner. Consequently, the pier may not be as open in practice as it is in theory. Accordingly, while Western Ferries retains exclusive access to its piers because it is privately owned and financed, CalMac must allow access to all vessels on the Gourock Pier and Argyll & Bute Council must allow similar access on the Dunoon Pier. At present, only a small number of fishing vessels and leisure boats take advantage of such access, but even if CalMac were the lone service provider, it would, in principle, have no right to prevent Western Ferries from using the piers;
• one of the reasons why Western Ferries has not made use of the "common user" piers of Gourock and Dunoon is the way public pier charges are calculated. They are divided into berthing dues and traffic dues, the former being based on the number of calls and the latter on the number of passengers carried. By using its own pier at Hunter's Quay, Western Ferries avoids paying increased traffic dues if it increases passenger volumes but remains responsible for pier maintenance and repair. However, analysis of its accounts reveals that this is cheaper than paying berthing dues at Dunoon. The same is true of CalMac's activity at Gourock Pier, which it owns. Western Ferries' charges at McInroy's Point are based on turnover, but are still cheaper than Dunoon Pier's charges;
• both operators have been asked by Argyll and Bute Council if they would share facilities. The response has been that they would require separate linkspans and marshalling areas.

4.2 The Vessels

4.2.1 CalMac

CalMac. operates four vessels on the Upper Clyde, which are interchangeable between the Gourock/Dunoon and Wemyss Bay/Rothesay routes. CalMac's four vessels are called the Juno, Jupiter, Saturn and Pioneer. Jupiter has Class 3 certification, so she can help with CalMac's Arran route as well. Pioneer has Class IIA certification and is capable of operating on any route in the CalMac network. She now acts as a fleet standby vessel all year round.

In the winter, a back-up ship is normally required to cover for ships undergoing their annual overhaul4, and, for the vessels mentioned above, Pioneer is used for this purpose as well as providing relief cover on the Mallaig/Small Isle service.

The vessels allocated to the two routes are summarised in Figure 4.1

Figure 4.3 Vessels on the Gourock/Dunoon and Wemyss Bay - Rothesay routes

Source: Ferry Publications Red Book

During the low season, one of the vessels is allocated to full-time operation on each of the two routes, with a third vessel rotating between them by providing rush hour cover on the Gourock/Dunoon route and operating on the Wemyss Bay/Rothesay route for the rest of the day. Similar arrangements prevail in the summer, but a further vessel is deployed on the Wemyss Bay/Rothesay route during this period to meet peak tourist demand. The purpose of this arrangement is to allow all vessels to be taken out of service for periodic maintenance. It also has the effect of spreading the usage of the vessels.

A number of factors make the CalMac vessels more expensive to operate than those of Western Ferries:

• they are expensive to upgrade or refurbish;
• they are comparatively expensive to maintain. Although the vessels have been well maintained and may be expected to last for some time to come, their maintenance has been on an annual cycle. This is because CalMac was not able to predict the eventual replacement date for its vessels with any certainty, since this was dependant on the public spending programme. Annual maintenance in this manner is more expensive than less frequent overhauls undertaken within a planned life cycle maintenance programme;

• they are technologically obsolete, as they are side and stem loading rather than bow and stern loading, like the Western Ferries vessels. This means:

• some car passengers may have to reverse to leave the vessel. Long commercial vehicles may be unable to perform the turn required. Accordingly, travellers may prefer to use Western Ferries' vessels;
• if CalMac takes longer than the timetabled 10 minutes to unload, the service may become delayed. If the service becomes delayed, then CalMac runs the risk of losing business to Western Ferries, since people can choose not to wait. The back-up vessel (when available) has been required to make up a sailing when the delays have accumulated;
• because of the technical aspects of side-loading and the exposed nature of Dunoon Pier, during adverse weather the vessels would not be able to berth side-to, resulting in additional cancellations;

• CalMac operates to a higher level of passenger certification than Western Ferries, because its vessels operate on the Wemyss Bay/Rothesay route which is further out to sea. In the winter, the Wemyss Bay routes are rated Class 4, while the Gourock/Dunoon route is a Class 5, to which less stringent standards apply. The different certification means that the present vessels must have more crew and equipment on board. The effect is that the vessels are over-specified for the Gourock/Dunoon route. If the present vessels were taken off the Wemyss Bay Rothesay route, some savings in manning costs might be realised;
• partly as a result of this higher specification, CalMac's vessels require more crew than Western Ferries. CalMac's vessels operate with a crew of nine, excluding catering staff, compared to Western Ferries' complement of four crew. These are the minimum crew numbers allowed by the MSA, irrespective of the number of passengers. The design of CalMac's vessels also necessitates more crew than Western Ferries' to dock the vessel and to evacuate passengers in an emergency;
• the crew work two and three day shifts and do not all live locally. Consequently, accommodation is provided on board for non-local crew;
• CalMac's vessels offer a higher level of on-board services than the Western Ferries' vessels, including the provision of lounges and bars. CalMac has recently contracted out its catering operations for both ship and shore catering.

These factors tend to increase CalMac's costs. In addition, its ships are faster than the Western Ferries' ships, with a speed of approximately 12 knots, and they are highly manoeuvrable, due to Voss Schneider propellers. However, this does result in higher fuel consumption and maintenance costs.

4.2.2 Western Ferries

Western Ferries does not use new vessels on the McInroy's Point/ Hunter's Quay route. Its hulls were purchased second-hand and refurbished and refitted. They appear in good condition. It is not known how many more such hulls are available world-wide.

Western Ferries' fleet is listed in Figure 4.4 overleaf.

Figure 4.4 Vessels operating on the Hunter's Quay/McInroy's Point Route

Source: Western Ferries

Scalpay and Sanda were totally refurbished when purchased in 1995 and 1996 respectively, including a complete renewal of their propulsion packages.

Western Ferries' vessels operate at eight knots, 33% slower than CalMac's vessels. However, the distance is shorter. Western Ferries currently runs more frequent services than CalMac, due to restrictions on service currently applied to CalMac: Western Ferries operates every 15-20 minutes, while CalMac operates half-hourly.

In terms of design, the vessels are more open to the weather and offer fewer comforts. However, they are all bow and stem loading, with ramps at both ends and can take longer vehicles than CalMac. Two of Western Ferries' vessels are also slightly less manoeuvrable than CalMac's.

4.3 Service Capacity

CalMac's vessel capacity is shown in Figure 4.5, while Western Ferries is shown in Figure 4.6 overleaf.

Figure 4.5 CalMac vessel capacity

Source: CalMac

Figure 4.6 Western Ferries vessel capacity

Source: Westem Ferries

Although Western Ferries' vessels are somewhat smaller than CalMac's in terms of car and passenger capacity, overall service capacity is also made up of frequency of sailings. The following figure illustrates the ability of Western Ferries to put on additional sailings:

Figure 4.7 Western Ferries runs

Source: Westem Ferries

What this shows is that:

• Western Ferries puts on around 20,000 runs per annum (under a 20 or 15 minute service). This compares to CalMac's scheduled 12,451 sailings (see Figure 4.18);
• Western Ferries puts on extra runs amounting to 16-18% of its scheduled runs, which CalMac, is restricted from doing.

The average level of utilisation for each service has been calculated by dividing the actual service offered, in terms of number of runs made, by the actual number of cars and passengers. The results are shown in Figure 4.8. The major implication of this calculation is that there is currently substantial overcapacity on the route.

Figure 4.8 Overall service capacity

Source: Deloitte & Touche, based on data supplied by CalMac & Western Ferries

A further question we examined was whether either operator, considered separately, could carry all the current traffic on the route, bearing in mind that neither operator is forecasting significant growth on the route.

If Western Ferries was to take all existing traffic, we calculate that its capacity utilisation over a full year would be 79% for cars and 25% for passengers.

If CalMac, was to do the same, its capacity utilisation would be 121% for cars, i.e., at their present capacity, they would not be able to meet demand. However, CalMac would also be able to meet route demand if its were permitted to alter its service patterns. Passenger capacity utilisation would also be 25%.

The assumptions used in this calculation are as follows:

Source: CalMac and Western Ferries