The Steamship Authority is looking at ways to steer through economic headwinds, as revenue has fallen off in the first half of 2026 and new tariffs add hefty sums to maintenance expenses.
At the ferry line’s board meeting in Hyannis Tuesday, officials said a budget crunch is likely, citing dips in the number of passengers and lower revenue from vehicle traffic and parking.
At the same time, steel and fuel prices are climbing, tariffs are hiking equipment costs and the ratio between full-fare vehicle tickets and Islanders’ excursion rates is tipping heavily towards the subsidized fares.
“We’re making less money on revenue, because the tickets that are increasing in quantity are the ones where we lose money on every one,” said Ted Gavin, the Vineyard’s representative on the Steamship Authority governing board.
To help steady the Steamship, treasurer/comptroller Mark Rozum has suggested a monthly cap on the number of times Islanders can use the excursion fares, which require proof of Island residence and registration.
Last year, excursion-rate automobile drivers paid less than a third — 27.3 per cent — of the actual cost of ferrying their vehicles and passengers to and from the Islands, according to a cost-of-service report from the Steamship Authority.
Standard-fare automobiles, by comparison, covered an average 155.5 per cent of their service cost.
The total number of car and truck excursion trips for 2025, in each direction, was 210,000 for the Vineyard route and another 35,000 for Nantucket, Mr. Rozum told the Steamship board and staff.
That equals 105,000 round-trip excursions between the Vineyard and the mainland, averaging 8,750 round-trip excursions a month in 2025 for a year-round population estimated at 20,500.
In past meetings, Mr. Rozum has told the board that while most excursion program members use the low rates about twice a month year-round, a small percentage are each making hundreds of subsidized trips a year.
The excursion program was designed for Islanders to reach medical appointments and other necessary mainland destinations, not for what appears in many cases to be business use, Mr. Rozum has said.
And the numbers continue to rise. Excursion program members made 534 more one-way trips this June than they did in June of 2025 — a 3.6 per cent increase for cars and a 2.6 per cent increase for trucks, according to the Steamship Authority’s monthly business report.
At the same time, standard-fare trips fell by 4 per cent for autos and 2.6 per cent for trucks over 20 feet long.
For 2026, the board approved an excursion fare increase of $2.75 in each direction. On Tuesday, Mr. Gavin asked about the financial impact of hiking the rate again.
Mr. Rozum said an additional $5 increase each way would save $1 million for the Authority, and another $1 million could be recouped by limiting the number of excursion fares a driver can purchase.
The Steamship Authority’s next reservation system, which is now being tested, is capable of charging program members the standard rate after two round-trip excursions a month, Mr. Rozum said.
“The number I came up with is about $1 million that would be potentially gained [by] changing it from an excursion fare to a standard fare, where you limit it to twice a month,” Mr. Rozum said.
Passenger trips are also down this year, and early August has shown little improvement, Mr. Rozum said.
“I just got the [first week’s] data this morning, and the stats were pretty much flat,” he said.
Parking revenue has fallen, too, with the number of cars parked at the Steamship Authority’s Cape Cod lots down by 6.1 percent in June and 12.5 per cent for the first six months of the year.
Ferry bookings for September are looking stronger, according to the business report, which shows a 6.7 per cent increase in reservations over 2025.
“But we are down in the summer months… and this will have an impact on the budget,” Mr. Rozum said.
Along with flat or declining revenues, the Steamship Authority also faces rising costs, Mr. Rozum said.
“Fuel is going to be a significant expense that we’re going to have to cope with, along with some pricing pressure on the maintenance side,” he said.
U.S. tariffs are imposing steep additional costs on ferry repairs: Customs, duties and taxes on parts and equipment made overseas have added more than $81,000 to the routine dry-docking of M/V Barnstable, according to a summary from engineering and maintenance director Zachary Lawrence.
Robert Jones, longtime representative for Barnstable on the Steamship Authority board, said the gloomy business report is nothing new for the authority, which operates in the red for most of the year.
“I don’t see anything different than has happened, you know, for the last 20 years,” Mr. Jones said.
“We turn the corner in August, and we always look at ups and downs and things like that… until the budget is established,” he said.
In other business Tuesday, the Steamship Authority board learned of a delay in fueling the M/V Island Home with the manufactured diesel known as RD-99.
The board voted last month to resume using the costlier, but lower-emission fuel for the Island Home’s engines, which currently emit visible smoke when powering up.
A recent train derailment in Worcester held up the fuel’s delivery, chief operating officer Mark Amundsen said, but it was on its way.
“We’re looking at the 21st [for] our first day of RD-99,” he said.
Also Tuesday, general manager Alex Kryska reported that it is likely to be another month or two before the now-vacated temporary terminal building in Woods Hole will be ready to be removed or demolished, because the authority is still removing computer lines.
The boat line then will solicit bids to clear the building site, which is destined to become a short-term parking area patrolled by Falmouth police.
Mr. Kryska said the town’s police chief asked him to install 15-minute parking signs because the current short-term area is being abused by rideshare drivers.
“[Police will be] enforcing that because they’ve seen it firsthand, that we have rideshare guys just sitting there all day long,” Mr. Kryska said.
“There’s one gentleman that parks there and actually coordinates all the other rideshares too, [and] their goal is to get rid of that guy,” he said.
Falmouth police also asked the Steamship Authority to add signage reminding motorists not to run the Railroad avenue stop sign when driving off the boats, Mr. Kryska said.
“By law, you’re supposed to yield to traffic that’s already on the road. But we’re finding that a lot of people kind of just do a rolling stop through there, so we’ve got to do what we can to make sure they stop and respect the traffic that’s already coming off Luscombe,” he said.
This article appears in August 21, 2026.
Two round trip excursion rates per month? That’s outrageous. Islanders are sent off island for many reasons (medical, sports, travel) that will often take them off more than twice per month. This will create a barrier for certain medical appointments like deductibles do. People will opt to wait for treatment until the next month or even further out delay treatments to avoid a potentially un-affordable full fare. And what about our sports kids who have to travel off for competition and development? Museum trips to enrich our lives? I’m appalled that we would be trapped just for profits.
This is punishment for the people who work and live on the island and do the work that sustains it. I object.
When a boat departs with empty space, that ‘inventory’ is gone forever. There is no incentive for someone to travel since there is no guaranteed standby as it used to be. We all know why it was eliminated due to the July 4th mayhem years ago, but there needs to be a reasonable way for people to have an expectation of travel if they arrive in Woods hole. With the staffing issues and maintenance cancallations in years past, many people I know have limited their travel on the SSA to only the absolute necessity type travel. Seasonals leave a car here for most of the year, or bring it for the season. The airlines, although expensive, seem to be very reliable despite the fog that engulfs the coastal airports often. Find a way to fill those empty spaces with full fare customers and you won’t have a deficit. With respect to fuel, is it purchased on the open market (foolishly) or at a predetermined contract price (intelligently) like the airlines do.
If the problem with Islander excursion fares is “a couple of people who are using the fare hundreds of times a year, then you deal with those few folks by finding our how/why. Why penalize everyone for the actions of a few.
Question: Which scenario generates more revenue for the SSA, an empty space on the vehicle deck or a local paying actual money for the ride?
A limit of two excursion trips a month? Mr Rozum does not live on an island and has no idea how it is to live on one. We will not be paying $300+ for our 3rd, 4th and 5th trips each month. You will have more cars kept in Falmouth and we will be renting more cars in Falmouth. How will that affect the Steamship’s bottom line?
So you should get ride of your slogan “Lifeline to the Islands” and change it to “No life for the Islands”.
Islanders support the local economy for the other 8 MONTHS or so when the seasonal owners and renters flee. Why load us with a PENALTY ?
Non Resident Seasonal Islanders should pay a higher trip fare for their trips – just like they should pay a higher REAL ESTATE tax for their big $$$ homes.
Excursion fares require a vehicle registered on the island, and a MA driver’s license listing an address on the island. Most seasonal residents don’t qualify and already are paying higher fares. Like it or not, the seasonal residents and visitors bring a lot of money that drives the current island economy (putting aside any opinions as to whether the tourism-driven economy and all that comes with it is a good thing or not).
There does seem to be a gap in the article between the two excursion fares per month mentioned and people doing hundreds of trips per year. It would make sense for any cap on use of the fares to have som flexibility, like x number per year, so that people who might have to get to a series of doctors appointments on the mainland would still be able to use the fares if their average usage of them for the whole year was reasonable. Without seeing the data, it’s hard to say what a reasonable cutoff would be.
Can anyone explain to me why the Barnstable has been in dry dock since June 11? That can’t be cheap. https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/shipid:8811002/zoom:14
Lived here my whole life, and it’s been a loooonnggggg time. I keep saying don’t mess with tourism or there will be no excursion rate. A cap is fine, 2 might be light but 4 is heavy so 3 times per month it is.
It would be interesting to compared the statistics of the airport for the same duration of time. Are more people flying? Or just less people all around?
Good idea. I don’t know how the island can plan without that kind of data. As a frequent user of the airport, its pretty obvious the planning to date has been terrible.
We have stopped using our car for off island excursions because it’s too difficult to reliably get a spot without significant advanced notice. It the volume is down it doesn’t appear to be reflected in vehicle availability. I wonder how much of the volume decrease is the result of providing poor service resulting in people like me (who would happily pay the full rate) finding alternatives methods of travel.
Passenger trips are down, yet more and more workers on the island commute, boats run with empty spaces while potential customers with cars are frequently turned away, the parking lot and staging area are largely unusable due to the shockingly expensive and seemingly unwanted and unnecessary terminal construction, it seems like decades of mismanagement are coming home to roost. But yeah, punish the year round islanders. They are older than ever now so let’s make it even less desirable for them and the young workers we so desperately need to live and work here. Fairly sure our great state Department of Transportation would run a much more efficient and economically viable ferry system.
Great comments regarding excursion rates. there has to be a better way. One item that would be interesting to see is how much the Steamship Authority spends annually on advertising; billboards, TV ads, print media, other. Is it really needed? Excursion changes to generate $1m in revenue? does advertising pay off? Seems like a waste. Finally, with today’s computer capabilities it’s hard for me to think that there’s not an efficient manner to deal with the empty spaces to create more revenue…..oh, And hats off to the SSA workers…….rain or shine dealing with the public is not easy. Just sit in the parking lot and watch the shenanigans from demanding customers!
please bring on the reality check of limited use of excursion fares! and people stop lying and cheating and abusing the system such that this corrective measure is even conceived of!
Move the employee parking lot at Palmer off-site.
Put in a Zipcar in that space
Day-rental cars at far less than an excursion fare
How about mentioning the 100+ million spent on the new terminal and buying/converting the “old” freight boats. Oh, and let’s keeping paying Bob Davis 250K/year for his consulting job. This is inexcusable. We actually live and work here and should not be expected to carry the burden of mismanagement.
Perhaps revenues are down because summer residents, who pay full fare, stay away due to rising numbers of tick born diseases on the island, and the slow response of officials to do the hard work of controlling the deer population that is largely causing the spread. Before looking narrowly at punishing year round residents, look outside the box at what may be causing the lower revenues. Leadership requires collaboration.
The numbers don’t add up: how can excursion fares only cover 27.3 percent while standard fares
cover 155.5 percent of the service cost? That would imply that the standard fare is 5.7 times the excursion fare, if referring to a per-trip basis. In fact the standard fare is approximately 2.3 times the excursion fare according to the published rates. (It also would imply that the actual per-trip cost for a standard vehicle in the summer is $204 each way!) If, instead the article refers in fact to overall yearly costs that would imply 8 to 10 million dollars revenue from excursion fares (on 210,000 trips), and roughly $36 million from standard fares. To raise an additional $1 million dollars per year excursion fares would have to go up around 12% but the same million could be obtained by raising the standard fare a mere 3%. But let’s start with the real waste, like Mr. Davis’ outrageous consulting contract.
I had a pet emergency in August that required 3 trips to the Cape Cod Veterinary Services in Bourne. On top of the expense of medical bills, getting punished with a full fare charge after 2 trips would have been cruel. Does the SSA think we just joyride on the ferry because it’s “only” $100 bucks?? People have multiple medical appointments, vet appointments, sports, and God forbid we just want to go visit our family or do some traveling. Where did it ever state that the excursion rate had conditions or qualifications?? Honestly. Do better.
I visit my parents in Vineyard Haven every month or so. I pay as much as $356 for a roundtrip ticket for my car and $22 for my passenger ticket. I’m out $5,000 a year to visit my parents. I think it’s ridiculous that Islanders are paying less than half of what I have to pay, just so I can subsidize them. Islanders chose to live on the Island, and that has a cost I shouldn’t have to pay for them. Fair is Fair – everyone should pay the same exact fare.