The Cowes Floating Bridge is expected to overspend its annual budget by £170,000 this year, with passenger numbers still significantly lower than before the pandemic.
Figures from the Isle of Wight Council’s latest performance report show that between April and June, 102,832 foot passengers and 69,912 vehicles used the Medina chain ferry. That’s up on the same quarter last year – but foot passenger numbers remain around 100,000 a year below pre-COVID levels.
The lower usage continues to limit fare income, while annual running costs remain high. The Council says the overspend is being driven largely by ongoing operational maintenance, including the annual purchase of new chains following a 2024 noise survey.
Officials have warned that increasing ticket prices to close the funding gap could further reduce passenger numbers. Instead, the shortfall will be covered by the Council’s corporate contingency fund, with a review of the service’s future already underway.
An outline business case for the Medina crossing is being revisited to determine the most economical and efficient long-term option. The findings are due to be presented to the Economy, Regeneration, Transport and Infrastructure Committee in October.
Doesn’t surprise me at all, I myself have gave up
on this piece of junk, it spends more time out of
service than in service.
A split condom is more effective.
So, let’s see….
There has been a floating bridge for 166 years (since 1859) and yet in its latest iteration (organised by certain Parties once again in power) it has been a right Dogs Dinner since day one!!!
And it’s called progress!!!
They should have kept the old one, much more
reliable.
This council are good at spending our money on
rubbish.
Why are we still discussing this? Why are we council tax payers allowing this saga to go on? This lump of junk has been a farce from the beginning and the decision to cut the losses and replace it was taken a year ago. So stop making up more and more flimsy excuses for delay after delay and do what you were elected to do – get the best value for the taxpayers’ money
They are living the idea that perhaps it will get better…..
They should get The Royal Navy to take it out into
the solent and sink it.
Good for practice.
To carry passengers and vehicles the ferry has to be operational.
It spends more time on the ropes than off the ropes.
its too expensive if you need to use it daily back and forth.
Its unreliable.
Its costing more than its worth.
Its an out of date and old fashioned type of service for todays traffic and pedestrians.
BUILD A BRIDGE for gods sake and scrap that money pit.
What an asset it would be to EVERYONE.
Why don’t they use a pie chart which shows days out of service so far this year..
Where did the undisclosed out of court settlement money go that the council was given?
The only real solution… which won’t happen of course, is a fixed link off the A3021 over the water into Newport Road in Cowes.
The Island has had little in the way of road capacity upgrades since the dual carriage way was built – and that was 50 years ago.
According to the internet, there were circa 13,600 cars on the the road on the Island in 1975. Yet the the dual carriage way was still considered a ‘relied road’. So there was obviously an awareness that that increasing number of cars needed increasing infrastructure to keep things flowing.
I can’t find a figure for 2025 – but a 2017 OTW article suggests in 2017 there were around 90,000 cars on the Island – with an estimated additional 15,000 onto of that by 2026 – which by my calculation would suggest there are somewhere around 100,000 cars on the Island – a 7 fold increase in the last 50 years.
Yet, there has been no increase in capacity. Only schemes that manage the flow of traffic which generally just move the weight of traffic somewhere else in the network.
This isn’t just an Isle of Wight problem – the UK as a whole has had chronic underinvestment in infrastructure. Power, Water, Road, Rail…
I wish I had an answer to the problem. All I really see if very gloomy days ahead for the UK.