As of this week, advanced booking is required for all BC Ferries travellers bringing their vehicles from Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo.
To book a ferry under the new system, beginning Wednesday, Oct. 15, passengers will have to go online to www.bcferries.com/RouteSelectionPage, where they can book and pay in advance since drive-up fares and reservation-only fares will no longer be available.
In a press release, BC Ferries said the move to advance bookings only is part of Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal’s multi-year re-development project, where necessary construction work has reduced vehicle holding space by 25 per cent.
When sailings are full, customers with standard vehicles can enter their e-mail for an alert if space opens up on a first-come, first-served basis. This is a new tool, only available on certain routes. Once tested and refined, BC Ferries plans to expand the alert tool to other routes across the system.
A separate digital wait-list tool for select routes is planned to be implemented later this year. Customers will be able to add themselves to a wait-list on sailings on which advance booking space was previously sold out. Under the planned system, if space becomes available, customers will be automatically booked on the sailing according to available capacity and their position on the wait-list.
In the release, BC Ferries stated that to help customers adjust and to improve the overall travel experience, BC Ferries is also offering more 'saver fares,' doubling availability to make up 40 per cent of all fares on the route, as well as waiving change fees on bookings through Nov. 30 to provide added flexibility during the transition.
"Alternate sailing options between the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island remain available to reduce congestion and provide more choice during construction," the statement noted. "Together, these initiatives are designed to keep people moving safely during terminal upgrades, give customers more certainty when space is limited, and lay the foundation for system-wide digital improvements in the years ahead."
