Yellow Pages
Skagit County commissioners voted Monday to extend weekday-evening service on the Guemes Island ferry for six more months over the objections of a rural preservation group on the island.
The ferry schedule will remain the same as it has been since a two-year trial period for evening runs began in July 2006. The schedule will continue to include five round-trip runs after 6 p.m., Monday through Thursday, until the end of the year.
The six-month extension is intended to give county staff more time to evaluate ridership and costs from the two-year trial.
The resolution adopting the six-month extension said that demand for continued evening service was one reason the trial period is being extended.
After the commissioners voted, Dave Wolf, a Friends of Guemes Island board member, said the decision to extend the evening runs might violate a judge’s order requiring the county to study the environmental impacts of the extended service before continuing it past June 30.
The county completed an environmental assessment last month that said the additional runs have not led to increased development on the island or to additional demands on an aquifer-based water supply that is already showing signs of saltwater intrusion.
Friends of Guemes is calling for a more thorough investigation into how the evening runs could lead to population growth and more demand on the aquifers.
“Unless and until the county completes studies that define the capacities of the island’s sole source aquifer and the impact of growth on this limited resource, no environmental review of the impacts of growth caused by late ferry operations will be complete or credible,” Wolf told the commissioners.
The commissioners said they expect to approve any permanent changes to the ferry schedule before year’s end.
