Masks required in ferry terminals

B.C. Ferries is expanding its mask-wearing rules as the company moves to conserve resources so it can continue serving coastal communities even as revenues decline.

As of Monday, masks will be mandatory inside terminals and on ships, unless someone is inside their vehicle or eating in a designated area, chief executive Mark Collins said.

Masks had been required only if someone was unable to physically distance themselves from others.

The guiding principle of the company is to protect the core of the service as a lifeline to its 47 ports of call, Collins said at Thursday’s annual general meeting.

“This is a marathon, not a sprint. It is going to take some time — maybe years — to get back to the ferry system that we knew,” he said.

“But we are making progress. As of Sept. 7, the ferry system will be back to 100 per cent of normal PRECOVID ferry capacity levels.”

With the onset of the pandemic, “we lost 80 per cent of our traffic in about 12 days,” Collins said. “It fell off the cliff. … It was absolutely unprecedented.”

Today, passenger numbers have recovered somewhat and are off 21 to 25 per cent of what is typical, he said.

Last year, B.C. Ferries carried 22 million passengers and nine million vehicles on 180,000 sailings, an increase of 4,200 from the previous year. It also carried about $8 billion worth of cargo.

B.C. Ferries’ 2019-20 annual report says net earnings in the past fiscal year were down by $23.4 million, or 44.8 per cent, from the previous year.

The corporation also had revenues rise by $15.7 million, or 1.7 per cent, year over year, because of factors such as a larger contribution from the B.C. government and a change from fuel rebates to a fuel surcharge.

Operating expenses in the past fiscal year increased by $35.4 million or 4.3 per cent versus the prior year.

B.C. Ferries also released its first-quarter results for the current fiscal year showing that the pandemic drove its net losses to $62 million, a drop from net earnings of $12.2 million for the same months last year. Revenue for the first quarter was $137.4 million, a decrease of $109 million year over year. The first quarter covers April, May and June.

The hit to B.C. Ferries’ earnings was partly offset by reducing operating expenses by $36.7 million in those months.

In three months ending June 30, B.C. Ferries operated 18,249 round trips. That’s a decline of 2,340 versus the same period in 2019.

A total of 2.2 million passengers and 1.3 million vehicles were carried this past quarter, down by 61.5 per cent and 46.7 per cent, respectively.