The Steamship Authority’s 5:30 a.m. summer freight boats are once again the target of unhappy Falmouth residents who say the terminal-bound truck traffic destroys their early-morning tranquility.

More than 100 people have signed a petition calling for the ferry line to remove the 5:30 a.m. Woods Hole departure from its summer 2024 schedule, while Falmouth select board chair Nancy Taylor wrote the Steamship board of governors last month asking that the time be changed to 6:30 a.m.

But Vineyard officials and Steamship Authority leaders continue to stoutly back the early summer boat, which brings trucks that deliver food and other daily needs to Island businesses at the start of the day before traffic builds up.

This week, the Steamship’s port council, an advisory group for the ferry line, voted to recommend the summer 2024 schedule, which includes the early ferry. The schedule will eventually go to the steamship’s governing board for approval.

“I think a lot of people in Falmouth don’t realize the parking problems that we have here on the Vineyard,” SSA port council chair Joe Sollitto said at the council’s monthly meeting Tuesday.

“By eight o’clock in the morning, there’s no parking spaces,” Mr. Sollitto said.

“I don’t think people realize that. Maybe they should come over to the Vineyard sometimes and see what our problems are,” he added.

The Steamship Authority has received letters of support for the 5:30 a.m. summer boat from Martha’s Vineyard Hospital and the towns of Edgartown and Oak Bluffs.

General manager Robert Davis said the early boat carries only trucks shorter than 40 feet, based on data showing that they make less noise than larger vehicles.

However, he added, the smaller size means there are more trucks overall.

“So we do recognize, you know, the impact that we have,” Mr. Davis said.

Director of shoreside operations Alison Fletcher added that many of the morning trucks are regular customers who know they’re not supposed to show up at the terminal too early.

“A lot of our frequent shippers, the ones that travel on those boats every day, are very good at abiding by the rules and trying to show up at the designated time,” Ms. Fletcher said.

It tends to be the occasional shippers who slip up, she said.

“They get reminded, they apologize and then that’s it,” Ms. Fletcher said.

Port council member and Tisbury resident John Cahill observed that Woods Hole is not the only SSA terminal with a 5:30 a.m. summer departure.

“[In] Tisbury, we also have a 5:30 boat throughout that same schedule … and I have not received, that I’m aware of, any complaints from the town of Tisbury,” Mr. Cahill said.

The port council voted unanimously to back the draft summer 2024 schedule with the 5:30 a.m. The Steamship board will hold its next meeting on the Vineyard, July 18 at 10 a.m. at the Tisbury emergency services facility on Spring street.

The 5:30 a.m. freighter was first added to the schedule in 2018, Mr. Davis said Tuesday.

Woods Hole residents have mounted opposition to it yearly since 2019, submitting petitions to require public hearings on the issue, but boat line leaders have remained unmoved.