REMARKS
Council member highlights ferry service issues at Brooklyn Army Terminal
1:33:32
·
128 sec
Council Member Avilés shares her personal experience with ferry service issues at Brooklyn Army Terminal, highlighting problems with overcrowding and long wait times.
- Waited 3 hours and saw 5 boats pass before being able to board
- Rockaway Reserve passengers were given priority, leaving regular passengers unable to board
- Many people, including the council member, left without using the ferry due to long wait times
- EDC acknowledges the issue and mentions policies to preserve seats for Sunset Park passengers
Alexa Avilés
1:33:32
I'll I'll follow-up on on this I have I have very specific questions around Homeport 2.
1:33:39
I guess one last question.
1:33:40
Thank you, Cherish, is I also have the benefit of having booklet army terminal there.
1:33:47
My daughter insisted that we used the rack away, and she didn't wanna do the rack away reserve, which I was cool with, to see what the regular people deal with.
1:33:59
We waited 5 boats 3 hours in the hot sun because every boat that came to BAT from Manhattan, if you had Rockaway Reserve, you got on.
1:34:09
If you were regular folks, you you didn't because they were all packed.
1:34:13
Which I was delighted to see, by the way.
1:34:15
So Philly mystified it and a little bit upset by it.
1:34:19
They weren't really crowded by the time they got to South Brooklyn.
1:34:23
So many, many people waited and many people left actually.
1:34:26
We ended up not going on.
1:34:28
I win another time.
1:34:29
Yeah.
1:34:29
But it does it does, you know, beg this situation, like, how do we rebalance at the peak and make sure that people on the southern part of the row don't have to wait 4 hours in the hot sun with no shade.
James Wong
1:34:44
So Absolutely.
1:34:45
Absolutely agree with you.
1:34:46
And that is not an acceptable service level.
1:34:50
I would ask, you know, if you ever have an experience like that, I do do ask you to reach out to for something that extreme, it really isn't acceptable.
1:34:57
What we've done in the past is that we've actually created because the problem of vessels filling up at Wall Street before they get to Brooklyn Army terminal, this goes back many years.
1:35:06
And we've instituted policies to make sure that we are preserving some number of seats for people at Sunset Park to get on board on every Rockawaybound vessel.
1:35:16
So, unfortunately, I'm I'm sorry to hear about your experience, but, like, we we have a plan that should be implemented on that.
1:35:22
And if not, please let let us know.
Franny Civitano
1:35:23
Yeah.
1:35:25
We will follow-up with the operator.
1:35:26
Yeah.
Alexa Avilés
1:35:26
We'll follow-up.
1:35:27
And I think it was a combination of, like, high peak high peak high demand, Rockaway.
1:35:33
You could see the Rockaway rocket people running on and everybody else like, damn.
James Wong
1:35:38
Yeah.
1:35:38
No.
1:35:38
That we it is important.
Alexa Avilés
1:35:40
But it's a it's a it's a real thing, and I guess it speaks to the rebalancing during those times because I saw a good number of people including myself leave after 3 hours.