![Passengers in Woodbridge board a test run of a passenger ferry service along the Potomac River in 2009. [Photo: Supervisor Frank Principi]](https://www.potomaclocal.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/080813-ferry-600x335.jpg)
WOODBRIDGE, Va. — Virginia’s transportation chief is ready to move forward with passenger ferry service from Woodbridge to Washington, D.C.
Sean Connaughton, the state’s Transportation Secretary, told Prince William officials on Tuesday that a commuter ferry service linking the two jurisdictions is closer now than ever before.
His comments come four years after elected officials and the press traveled an inaugural running of a Potomac River test ferry from Woodbridge to Washington during a public demonstration demonstration. There have also been as many as three studies to determine a demand for such a service.
“We are about to finish the third study…and we think we have been able to validate a market demand for a passenger ferry along three corridors: along the Potomac and Anacostia rivers,” Woodbridge District Supervisor Frank Principi told Connaughton.
The results of the latest study are expected in early September. The next phase of a possible ferry service would be a three-year demonstration project to see if the service catches on with commuters.
On a longtime wish list of transportation alternatives for the region, a passenger ferry service would most likely link commuters to job centers in Alexandria and Washington.
The state would acquire boats for the service, as well as fund much-needed parking spaces in Prince William County for commuters.
A 2009 report showed an anticipated cost for the ferry service would be $20 million, and the ferry would travel an average of 30 knots mph, about 35 mph.
“We’ll find a couple small, cheap boats, get this up and see how many start to potentially use it, and if it becomes viable, make it part of the transportation alternatives in the region,” said Connaughton.
Finding places for the ferries to dock will be another challenge for the state.
Because of new transportation funding legislation passed earlier this year, new sources of funding are now available for the ferry that weren’t there four years ago, and the ferry could be placed in the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Six-Year Plan beginning next year.
