By Bruce Fegen

A PROPOSED high-speed cross-Forth ferry service between Fife and Edinburgh that would slash rush-hour journey times into the capital and ease the pressure on the Forth Road Bridge, would cost at least £3.80 a trip, a top expert has concluded.

But any such service would require a subsidy of at least £1.5 million from the public purse, says transport group Stagecoach which recently floated the ferry idea and engaged consultant Doug Hudson, who used to work for the firm’s New Zealand ferry business Fullers and is now a director of Ferry Biz Solutions, to look at the proposal.

His study has come out in favour of Leith as the base on the Edinburgh side, but although he says that a crossing from Burntisland (4.7 miles) would be cheaper than Kirkcaldy (8.5 miles), Stagecoach stressed yesterday that they had no clear preference.

The preferred vessel would be a 32-metre catamaran (cost new £2 million each or around £1 million second-hand) with a capacity for 250 passengers. The Kirkcaldy route would require two vessels, while the Burnt-island route could operate with one. Total annual running costs for the Burntisland route are estimated at £1.2 million and for the Kirkcaldy route £2.65 million.

To run a break-even service from Burntisland, it is estimated that just under 317,000 passengers a year would use the service at an average single fare of £3.80. From Kirkcaldy, just over 590,000 passengers at an average single fare of £4.50 would be required. The numbers assume 24 return trips per weekday and 12 return trips at weekends and crossing times have been estimated at around eight minutes from Burntisland and 17 minutes from Kirkcaldy.

Said Stagecoach’s Steve Stewart, “Clearly, the break-even position would vary depending on any movement up or down in the average fare.”

Whatever crossing is chosen, some work would have to be carried out to the infrastructure at the Leith side by Forth Ports and a further meeting is planned shortly involving Stagecoach chief executive Brian Souter and Forth Ports executive Alan Burns.

Mr Stewart added, “We believe the project could be delivered via a kick-start style pump-priming mechanism, which was developed by Stagecoach for bus services and has been adopted by the Government and the Scottish Executive.

“Essentially, it is a three-year programme to get a service to the point of commercial viability. There is higher public funding in year one and this tapers off by year three.

“The concept is designed so that at the end of the period the service can stand on its own two feet. Our proposal would envisage public revenue support totalling around £1.5 million during the three-year period.

“A lot more work still needs to be done on the proposals. Burntisland has advantages but there are other issues such as transport links with the town that have to be looked at, and there is no clear preference.

“We have not put this forward as an alternative to another bridge across the Forth, a separate bridge is needed on that, but our proposal does have the advantage of being able to be introduced quite quickly.

“A new bridge would take 10 years or so to build, while constructing a new terminal with ticketing and parking facilities in Fife would only take between 12 and 18 months.”