Golden Gate Ferry is a commuter ferry service operated by the

Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District The Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District is a special-purpose district that owns and operates three regional transportation assets in the San Francisco Bay Area: the iconic Golden Gate Bridge, the Golden Gate Ferry system and ...

San Francisco Bay San Francisco Bay is a large tidal estuary in the U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the big cities of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland. San Francisco Bay drains water from a ...

, part of the

Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Gov ...

Northern California Northern California (colloquially known as NorCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. Spanning the state's northernmost 48 counties, its main population centers incl ...

, United States. Regular service is run to the Ferry Building in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

from Larkspur,

Sausalito Sausalito (Spanish for "small willow grove") is a city in Marin County, California, United States, located southeast of Marin City, south-southeast of San Rafael, and about north of San Francisco from the Golden Gate Bridge. Sausalito's p ...

, Tiburon, and

Angel Island Angel Island may refer to: *Angel Island (California), historic site of the United States Immigration Station, Angel Island, and part of Angel Island State Park, in San Francisco Bay, California * Angel Island, Papua New Guinea * ''Angel Island'' (n ...

Marin County Marin County is a county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and largest city is San Rafael. Marin County is acros ...

, with additional service from Larkspur to

Oracle Park Oracle Park is a Major League Baseball stadium in the SoMa neighborhood of San Francisco, California. Since 2000, it has been the home of the San Francisco Giants. Previously named Pacific Bell Park, SBC Park, and AT&T Park, the stadium's curre ...

and

Chase Center Chase Center is an indoor arena in the Mission Bay neighborhood of San Francisco, California. The building is the home venue for the Golden State Warriors of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and occasionally for the University of San ...

t. The ferry service is funded primarily by passenger fares and

Golden Gate Bridge The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate, the strait connecting San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. The structure links the U.S. city of San Francisco, California—the northern tip of the San Francisco Pen ...

tolls. In , Golden Gate Ferry had a ridership of , or about per weekday as of . Golden Gate Ferry is a different system from

San Francisco Bay Ferry San Francisco Bay Ferry is a public transit passenger ferry service in the San Francisco Bay, administered by the San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority (WETA). In , the system had a ridership of , or about per weekday a ...

, which provides passenger ferry service between San Francisco and counties other than Marin.

History

Golden Gate Ferry began service between San Francisco and Sausalito on August 15, 1970 with the M.S. ''Golden Gate''. Service to Larkspur started in 1976. Service to Pacific Bell Park (now Oracle Park) started in 2000. Tiburon service began on March 6, 2017, replacing service that had been run by

Blue & Gold Fleet Blue & Gold Fleet is a privately owned company in the United States providing ferry services in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. It operates the San Francisco Bay Ferry commuter ferry system under contract with WETA. Blue & Gold also op ...

and other private operators since 1962. Service to Chase Center began in 2019 using an interim terminal located at Pier 48½. A permanent Mission Bay terminal is expected to open in 2021 at the foot of 16th Street to replace the nearby interim Chase Center terminal. The agency began operating ferries to Angel Island in December 2021.

Routes

Administration building at Larkspur Landing, November 2018

Golden Gate Ferry operates regular passenger ferry service on four routes: *

Larkspur Landing Larkspur Landing, also known as Larkspur Ferry Terminal, is the main Golden Gate Ferry terminal in Larkspur, California, in Marin County, north of San Francisco. The terminal is a regional hub receiving heavy service from throughout the North Ba ...

–

San Francisco Ferry Building The San Francisco Ferry Building is a terminal for ferries that travel across the San Francisco Bay, a food hall and an office building. It is located on The Embarcadero in San Francisco, California and is served by Golden Gate Ferry and San ...

Sausalito Ferry Terminal Sausalito Ferry Terminal is a ferry terminal in Sausalito, California, connecting Marin County and San Francisco. The station is served by Golden Gate Ferry and Blue & Gold Fleet ferries as well as Golden Gate Transit and Marin Transit bus route ...

– San Francisco Ferry Building *

Tiburon Ferry Terminal The Tiburon Ferry Terminal is a ferry landing for Golden Gate Ferry and Angel Island–Tiburon Ferry Company passenger ferries in Tiburon, California in the San Francisco Bay Area's North Bay. It connects commuters from Marin County with job cen ...

– San Francisco Ferry Building *

– San Francisco Ferry Building Limited service operates from Larkspur to

for

San Francisco Giants The San Francisco Giants are an American professional baseball team based in San Francisco, California. The Giants compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) West division. Founded in 1883 as the New Yor ...

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

home games and from Larkspur to

for

Golden State Warriors The Golden State Warriors are an American professional basketball team based in San Francisco. The Warriors compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA), as a member of the league's Western Conference Pacific Division. Founded in 194 ...

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

home games. Supplemental service is provided for special events.

Fares and transfers

Golden Gate Ferry fares differ by route, passenger type, and method of payment. As of December 2021, fares are as follows: Transfer discounts are available to/from

Golden Gate Transit Golden Gate Transit (GGT) is a public transportation system serving the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in California, United States. It primarily serves Marin County, Sonoma County, and San Francisco, and also provides limited ser ...

Marin Transit Marin Transit is a public bus agency in Marin County, California, in the United States. Originally formed in 1964 as Marin County Transit District (MCTD), Marin Transit was re-branded on 30 July 2007 and now provides a variety of fixed-route and de ...

Muni Muni may refer to: Municipal * A common US abbreviation for municipal, municipal services, and the like *Municipal bond *Municipal Bridge, the former name of the George Rogers Clark Memorial Bridge in Louisville, Kentucky *"Muni", slang for a mu ...

, and

SMART Smart or SMART may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Smart'' (Hey! Say! JUMP album), 2014 * Smart (Hotels.com), former mascot of Hotels.com * ''Smart'' (Sleeper album), 1995 debut album by Sleeper * ''SMart'', a children's television ser ...

for Clipper card users.

Fleet

Golden Gate Ferry has a fleet of four

catamaran A Formula 16 beachable catamaran Powered catamaran passenger ferry at Salem, Massachusetts, United States A catamaran () (informally, a "cat") is a multi-hulled watercraft featuring two parallel hulls of equal size. It is a geometry-stab ...

s and three

monohull image:monohull.svg, right A monohull is a type of boat having only one hull (watercraft), hull, unlike multihulled boats which can have two or more individual hulls connected to one another. Fundamental concept Among the earliest hulls were simple ...

vessels. All ferries are wheelchair accessible. The catamarans can carry 30 bicycles, and the monohull vessels can carry 150 bicycles. All ferries have restrooms and on-board refreshments, including a full bar. The monohull vessels are named M.S. ''Marin'', M.S. ''San Francisco'', and M.S. ''Sonoma''. The Marin can carry 750 passengers, and the San Francisco and Sonoma can carry 630 passengers each. They were purchased from Philip F. Spaulding & Associates in

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

in 1976–1977. They were originally powered by

gas turbine A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directi ...

water jets but were converted to

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-call ...

propeller drives in 1983–1985. More efficient diesel engines were installed in 2001-2002. The ''Marin'' was refurbished from November 2006 to July 2007. The catamarans are named the M.V. ''Del Norte'', M.V. ''Golden Gate'', M.V. ''Mendocino'', and M.V. ''Napa''. The ''Del Norte'' has a capacity of 400 passengers while the other three vessels have a capacity of 450 passengers. The 1998-built ''Del Norte'' and 2001-built ''Mendocino'' were built for Golden Gate Ferry to allow faster and more frequent service than the monohull ferries. The ''Napa'' (formerly ''Snohomish'') and ''Golden Gate'' (formerly ''Chinook'') were purchased from

Washington State Ferries Washington State Ferries (WSF) is a government agency that operates automobile and passenger ferry service in the U.S. state of Washington as part of the Washington State Department of Transportation. It runs ten routes serving 20 terminals loca ...

in January 2009. In late 2018, Golden Gate Ferry reached an agreement to lease the MV ''Millennium'' from Rhode Island Fast Ferry for one year for $2.5 million. The ''Millennium'' allowed full service to continue while the ''Marin'' and ''Sonoma'' underwent major work and the other ferries received regular maintenance. The ''Millennium'' remained in service until 2020 before returning to Rhode Island. When the M.S. ''Golden Gate'' retired in 2004, she had made 42,108 round trips between Sausalito and San Francisco, carried 21 million passengers, and traveled nearly .

References

External links

*
Golden Gate Bridge District
{{SFBAtransit

Ferry A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi ...

Ferry companies of California Public transportation in San Francisco 1970 establishments in California