Ferries in the inner harbour area

Abstract

The Grand Harbour area is the main area where people are employed. The residential areas are shifting away from the Grand Harbour area and in many cases these have developed as suburbs to the walled cities namely Valletta and the Cottonera. Workers have to travel daily to the centre of the Grand Harbour area. Several workers have to travel round the harbour creeks in order to reach the capital city which is only a couple of hundred metres across the main channel of the harbours. This concentration of cars creates daily traffic jams which cause delays on the arrival of employees to their place of work. This will justify the need to study for some alternative means of transport using shorter routes. In the past there has been a ferry service which linked Valletta with the other sides of the harbours. This service was run by two large private companies. Boatmen also made the small trip across the creeks. To-day these have all died except the Sliema - Valletta ferry which was revived a few years ago. The decline of these ferries resulted mainly from the introduction of public buses which picked people from various points in many cases nearer to the peoples' homes. Time has changed. The main users of ferries would be mainly tourists and employees working in Valletta who may have to come even from Gozo. These and some other aspects must be studied to support the introduction of a ferry service.