Frog Ferry

The "Frog Ferry" is a proposed ferry that would serve Portland, Oregon, going between Cathedral Park and the south waterfront. Although called a "ferry", it is perhaps more akin to a water taxi, since its main direction is upstream, rather than across the river. The Frog Ferry service has been in development for five years, and reputedly will open its first service sometime in 2023. There is currently some type of controversy between the Frog Ferry planners and TriMet, the regional transit agency, but it seems difficult to explain. And perhaps not too important.

There are two major reasons for the proposal for ferry service. The first is that while driving between the Saint Johns area and downtown Portland is easy enough, driving through it can be very time consuming. This is especially the case on bus service, where intermediate stops can double the time of a half hour trip. So by taking the river, passengers are able to avoid the small streets and frequent stops of downtown Portland to get to the newly developed South Portland Waterfront area. There is some logistical justification for that. However, I also feel that there is a "nifty" factor to ferry service, and that it is almost akin to a "monorail" as far as being a flashy service. From what I can see of the Frog Ferry website, it is slickly, professionally done, with animated maps, and extensive sections on indigenous history and the history of ferry transportation...all of which is good enough, but I do feel like this service seems to be more about style than substance.

A growing city (even if it just shrunk a little bit) has a host of transportation needs. One of the biggest problems in Portland is that the light rail service, designed for a downtown of the 1980s, takes too much time going through downtown to be a regional rail service. Adding a ferry that bypasses downtown can take (according to the website) 70 people at once, but it is a lot of overhead to move a few dozen people. Especially considering the overheads, it seems like a lot of the things that the Frog Ferry proposes to deal with could be dealt with by express bus service from Saint Johns to downtown. I still hope the ferry goes into operation, and I would love to get a chance to ride it, but it seems more like a curiosity than a series piece of transportation infrastructure.