More money required for Airport Ferry Refit, as total closes in on One Million Dollar mark

The travels of the Digby Island Ferry will require the city of Prince Rupert to add on to the budget for its refit, that after workers at the Point Hope Maritime shipyard in Victoria discovered some additional issues that need to be addressed when it comes to the condition of the aging vessel that transits from Fairview Bay to Digby Island seven days a week.

On Monday evening, the City's Chief Financial Officer Corinne Bomben provided the update for council, outlining the nature of the additional work which will be required towards steel plate replacement, sand blasting and painting of the hull, with the cost of the additional work to come to 350,000 dollars.

As we noted in our blog post of March 25th, the original cost of the refit had come through the City of Prince Rupert's Request for bids process at $347,000 with an additional $264,000 required for the replacement barge service. 

That bid was awarded by Council in October of last year, with the Point Hope Maritime Bid the lowest of three considered.

October 11, 2018 -- Airport ferry refit contract awarded by City Council Tuesday

With the additional 350,000 dollars added to the total as of Monday night, the refit project is now closing in on the million dollar mark, pending any further surprises.

The additional funds for the repairs will be taken out of the 8.1 million dollar capital infrastructure grant recently delivered by the Province of British Columbia.

The Airport Ferry departed for Victoria at the end of March and was scheduled to return to Prince Rupert by the end of this month, Ms. Bomben did not indicate how much additional time would be required for the additional work.

The extension to the cost of the barge and tug service which is currently running in place of the Airport Ferry, has been included in the additional 350,000 dollar cost.

For more notes related to the Airport ferry see our Transportation archive here.

Further notes on Monday's City Council Session can be reviewed from our Council Timeline feature here as well as our archive page for Monday's session here.

A wider overview of Council discussion themes can be explored here.

Cross posted from the North Coast Review