Weehawken Port Imperial Ferry Terminal on Hudson River

NY Waterway (or New York Waterway) is a private transportation company running

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 ...

and

bus service Public transport bus services are generally based on regular operation of transit buses along a route calling at agreed bus stops according to a published public transport timetable. History of buses Origins While there are indications ...

in the

Port of New York and New Jersey The Port of New York and New Jersey is the port district of the New York-Newark metropolitan area, encompassing the region within approximately a radius of the Statue of Liberty National Monument. It includes the system of navigable water ...

and in the

Hudson Valley The Hudson Valley (also known as the Hudson River Valley) comprises the valley of the Hudson River and its adjacent communities in the U.S. state of New York. The region stretches from the Capital District including Albany and Troy south to ...

. The company utilizes public-private partnership with agencies such as the

Port Authority of New York and New Jersey The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, PANYNJ; stylized, in logo since 2020, as Port Authority NY NJ, is a joint venture between the U.S. states of New York and New Jersey, established in 1921 through an interstate compact authorized ...

, New Jersey Transit, New York City Department of Transportation, and Metropolitan Transportation Authority to provide service and maintain docking facilities. NY Waterway uses

ferry slip A ferry slip is a specialized docking facility that receives a ferryboat or train ferry. A similar structure called a barge slip receives a barge or car float that is used to carry wheeled vehicles across a body of water. Often a ferry intend ...

s at four terminals in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

as well as terminals and slips in

Jersey City Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.Hoboken,

Weehawken Weehawken is a township in the northern part of Hudson County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is located largely on the Hudson Palisades overlooking the Hudson River. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 17,197.

, and Edgewater, all located along the Hudson River Waterfront Walkway. Commuter peak service is also provided on the Haverstraw–Ossining Ferry, Newburgh–Beacon Ferry, and to the Raritan Bayshore. Excursions and sightseeing trips include those to

Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the origi ...

, Gateway National Recreation Area, and Governors Island. The Manhattan to Jersey City route is used as one of the alternatives for connecting the New York and New Jersey segments of the East Coast Greenway hiking and biking trail, the other choice being the George Washington Bridge. As of November 2019, NY Waterway has a total fleet of 32 vessels.

History

Founding and early years

In 1981

Arthur Edward Imperatore, Sr. Arthur Edward Imperatore Sr. (July 8, 1925November 18, 2020) was an American businessman and sports owner from New Jersey. He was best known as being the founder and president of the NY Waterway, a ferry service. After serving in the United Stat ...

, a trucking magnate, purchased a length of the

Weehawken, New Jersey Weehawken is a Township (New Jersey), township in the North Hudson, New Jersey, northern part of Hudson County, New Jersey, Hudson County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is located largely on the Hudson Palisades overlooking the North River ...

waterfront, where the company is based, from the bankrupt

Penn Central The Penn Central Transportation Company, commonly abbreviated to Penn Central, was an American Railroad classes, class I railroad that operated from 1968 to 1976. Penn Central combined three traditional corporate rivals (the Pennsylvania Railroad ...

for $7.5 million, with the plan to redevelop the

brownfield site In urban planning, brownfield land is any previously developed land that is not currently in use. It may be potentially contaminated, but this is not required for the area to be considered brownfield. The term is also used to describe land prev ...

as had others along the west bank of the Hudson River waterfront and to restore ferry service to it. In 1986 he established

New York Waterway NY Waterway (or New York Waterway) is a private transportation company running ferry and bus service in the Port of New York and New Jersey and in the Hudson Valley. The company utilizes public-private partnership with agencies such as the Port ...

, with a route across the river between

Weehawken Port Imperial Port Imperial is an intermodal transit hub on the Weehawken, New Jersey, waterfront of the Hudson River across from Midtown Manhattan, served by New York Waterway ferries and buses, Hudson–Bergen Light Rail, and NJT buses. The district lies ...

and Pier 78 on the West Side of

Midtown Manhattan Midtown Manhattan is the central portion of the New York City borough of Manhattan and serves as the city's primary central business district. Midtown is home to some of the city's most prominent buildings, including the Empire State Buildin ...

. Three years later, it began operation between Hoboken Terminal and Battery Park City. During the course of the next decade numerous routes across the

Hudson Hudson may refer to: People * Hudson (given name) * Hudson (surname) * Henry Hudson, English explorer * Hudson (footballer, born 1986), Hudson Fernando Tobias de Carvalho, Brazilian football right-back * Hudson (footballer, born 1988), Hudso ...

were added. NY Waterway briefly also operated a

high-speed ferry A high-speed craft (HSC) is a high-speed water vessel for civilian use, also called a fastcraft or fast ferry. The first high-speed craft were often hydrofoils or hovercraft, but in the 1990s catamaran and monohull designs become more popul ...

from Staten Island to East 34th Street in 1998, but discontinued it due to low ridership. This marked the first time that NY Waterway discontinued a route.

Expansion and near bankruptcy

The

September 11, 2001 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial ...

on the

World Trade Center World Trade Centers are sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may refer to: Buildings * List of World Trade Centers * World Trade Center (2001–present), a building complex that includes five skyscrapers, a ...

destroyed the

PATH A path is a route for physical travel – see Trail. Path or PATH may also refer to: Physical paths of different types * Bicycle path * Bridle path, used by people on horseback * Course (navigation), the intended path of a vehicle * Desire p ...

terminal located there, greatly reducing cross-

Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between N ...

passenger capacity. The company was well-positioned to take advantage of government investment in ferry service, receiving subsidies and generous agreements to docking at public facilities. NY Waterway service quickly expanded by adding new routes and increasing the frequency of crossings, heavily borrowing to fund the acquisition of additional vessels. After PATH service was restored ridership significantly declined, the loss of passengers bringing the company, unable to reduce its fixed costs, to brink of bankruptcy. By December 2004, there was deep concern that there would be a total shutdown of ferry service, disrupting the commutes of 30,000 daily riders. The Port Authority, as well as city and state agencies had already contracted the construction of new ferry terminals to be leased to private operators. The shutdown was averted when the new Billybey Ferry Company, which had never before operated ferry services, founded by Manhattan lawyer William B. Wachtel, agreed to take over almost half of NY Waterway's equipment and routes. The remaining service remained under control of the Port Imperial Ferry Corporation, the legal name of the original organization. Other ferry and sightseeing boat operators were displeased that the Port Authority approved the transfer without a transparent bidding process. In December 2016, the company announced it would reacquire Billybey Ferry and merge ownership back under a single roof.

East River Ferry

In February 2011, NY Waterway was contracted to operate a route calling at slips in

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

and

Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...

as well as the

East River The East River is a saltwater tidal estuary in New York City. The waterway, which is actually not a river despite its name, connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates the borough of Queens ...

terminals, replacing an earlier peak-only service operated by New York Water Taxi. In June 2011, the NY Waterway-operated East River Ferry line started operations. The route was a 7-stop East River service that ran between East 34th Street and Pier 11, making one intermediate stop in Queens and four in Brooklyn. The fare was $4 per one-way ticket. Subsidized by the City of New York, the service was originally intended for commuters, but after a few months became popular with weekend users and tourists. It was used by two to six times the number of passengers that the city predicted would ride the ferries. From June to November 2011, the ferry accommodated 2,862 riders on an average weekday, as opposed to a projection of 1,488 riders, and it had 4,500 riders on an average weekend, six times the city's projected ridership; in total, the ferry saw 350,000 riders in that period, over 250% of the initial ridership forecast of 134,000 riders. The route was merged into NYC Ferry on May 1, 2017, coming under the operation of Hornblower Cruises.

Rescue operations

NY Waterway has played a role in a number of rescue and emergency operations. In the immediate aftermath of collapse of the World Trade Center, the company played a major role in the maritime response following the September 11 attacks and the evacuation of passengers who otherwise would have been stranded because of the chaos in the regional transportation network. It is estimated that NY Waterway transported over 150,000 people. The

Hudson Riverfront 9/11 Memorial The ''Hudson Riverfront 9/11 Memorial'', also known as the ''Weehawken 9/11 Memorial'', is a memorial in Weehawken, New Jersey. It commemorates the '9/11 boat lift', the emergency rescue response, and those who perished (including five Weehawken ...

is located near NY Waterway terminal. The ferry service also brought people across the river during

Northeast Blackout of 2003 The Northeast blackout of 2003 was a widespread power outage throughout parts of the Northeastern and Midwestern United States, and most parts of the Canadian province of Ontario on Thursday, August 14, 2003, beginning just after 4:10 p.m. ...

when service on New Jersey Transit and Port Authority Trans-Hudson trains could not operate. During the

2005 New York City transit strike The 2005 New York City transit strike, held from December 20 through 22, 2005, was the third strike ever by the Transport Workers Union Local 100 against New York City's Transit Authority and involved between 32,000 and 34,000 strikers. In Dece ...

it provided alternative transportation. In 2009, the company was instrumental in the rescue of passengers of

US Airways Flight 1549 US Airways Flight 1549 was a regularly scheduled US Airways flight from New York City (LaGuardia Airport), to Charlotte, North Carolina, Charlotte and Seattle, in the United States. On January 15, 2009, the Airbus A320 serving the flight bir ...

, which made an emergency landing on the Hudson River. The firm gained media attention both for its efforts to rescue passengers from airplane and for its hiring of 19-year-old Brittany Catanzaro as captain. Thanks in a large part to the successful efforts of Captains Vincent Lombardi and Catanzaro, together with their crews, all aboard were rescued. On April 6, 2012, a NY Waterway ferry rescued the crew of the ''Katherine G'', a tugboat that capsized near Liberty Island. The ferry's captain, Mohamed Gouda, had also commanded one of the ferries that participated in the flight 1549 rescue.

Controversies

9/11 fraud settlement

In 2003 the US began investigating NY Waterways in allegations that the region's leading private ferry company defrauded the federal government of hundreds of thousands of dollars in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attack. The United States attorney and the inspector general were trying to determine whether New York Waterway submitted invoices enabling the company to be paid twice for the same expenses and whether it overcharged for other items. In July 2006 NY Waterway agreed to pay $1.2 million to settle civil fraud charges brought by the United States in connection with payments made by the government to NY Waterway for ferry service after the

. The Government alleged in its complaint that NY Waterway inflated its incremental costs, overstated its ferry service profit margin, and submitted false bills to the Port Authority to gain reimbursement for charter boat expenses that NY waterway, in fact, did not incur.

Homeport controversy

The " home port" for maintenance and refueling has long been located at Weehawken Port Imperial. NY Waterway sold the upland property and in November 2017 purchased former Union Dry Dock site in Hoboken to build a new facility. The city and the company are embroiled in a dispute over its construction. The city has refused to grant permission to allow the project to proceed saying that it prevents completion of the a contiguous waterfront walkway. A plan for NJ Transit to purchase the property and lease it to NY Waterway was withdrawn after intervention by

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

Phil Murphy NY Waterway is suing the city to allow it to continue with construction. NY Waterway and city reached a deal in which the ferry company would sell the land to the municipality for about $18.5 million, but the sale as of November 2022 had not been finalized. It was then suggested the homeport in Weehawken would instead be expanded. In January 2022, the municipality passed a resolution opposing the expansion of what has long been a temporary facility. The property in Hoboken again become controversial with proposals to acquire it via

eminent domain Eminent domain (United States, Philippines), land acquisition (India, Malaysia, Singapore), compulsory purchase/acquisition (Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, United Kingdom), resumption (Hong Kong, Uganda), resumption/compulsory acquisition (Austr ...

Safety issues

On November 24, 2019, the

U.S. Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, military, multi ...

pulled 23 ferries out of the company's 32-vessel fleet due to safety issues following a routine annual inspection. Customers experienced delays the following day, but all but one vessel had resumed service by the evening of November 25.

Alleged violations of the Clean Water Act

Two former employees alleged in November 2020 that the company ordered employees to dump untreated sewage into the Hudson.

NJ Transit fare-sharing

In June 2012, New Jersey Transit and NY Waterway began a fare-sharing program for riders transferring between the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail and ferries at

Port Imperial Port Imperial is an intermodal transit hub on the Weehawken, New Jersey, waterfront of the Hudson River across from Midtown Manhattan, served by New York Waterway ferries and buses, Hudson–Bergen Light Rail, and NJT buses. The district lies ...

for ten-trip and monthly tickets. in a program called ''Surf and Turf'' In May 2013 NY Waterway initiated afternoon bus service along the NJT bus routes 158, and 159R, which travel north to Fort Lee, and 156R, with continuing service to

Englewood Cliffs Englewood Cliffs is a borough in Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, whose population at the 2010 United States census was 5,281.Port Authority Bus Terminal The Port Authority Bus Terminal (colloquially known as the Port Authority and by its acronym PABT) is a bus station, bus terminal located in Manhattan in New York City. It is the busiest bus terminal in the world by volume of traffic, serving abo ...

during mornings and travel by ferry in the evening. In December 2014 it was announced that NJT will buy ten buses for NY Waterway's use on its Manhattan bus routes. In January 2016, NY Waterway and NJT introduced the Hudson GoPass, allowing for unlimited use on light rail, ferry and bus routes 156, 158, 159. NJ Transit has also provided funding for boat maintenance and bus purchases.

Routes and terminals

New Jersey—Manhattan services

Manhattan services originate across four localities in New Jersey: Edgewater in

Bergen County Bergen County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Weehawken Weehawken is a township in the northern part of Hudson County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is located largely on the Hudson Palisades overlooking the Hudson River. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 17,197.

, Hoboken, and

Jersey City Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.Hudson County. These localities are listed below from north to south.

Upstream Hudson services

The Haverstraw–Ossining Ferry connects Haverstraw in

Rockland County Rockland County is the southernmost county on the west side of the Hudson River in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. It is about from the Bronx at their closest points. The county's population, as of th ...

with Ossining in

Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population o ...

. The Ossining terminal is located adjacent to

Ossining station Ossining station is a commuter rail stop on the Metro-North Railroad's Hudson Line, located in Ossining, New York. It is one of two express stations on that line south of Croton–Harmon, along with Tarrytown, that serve most trains, excluding ...

, which is served by

Metro-North Metro-North Railroad , trading as MTA Metro-North Railroad, is a suburban commuter rail service run by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a public authority of the U.S. state of New York and under contract with the Connecticut D ...

's Hudson Line. The Newburgh–Beacon Ferry connects Newburgh in

Orange County Orange County most commonly refers to: *Orange County, California, part of the Los Angeles metropolitan area Orange County may also refer to: U.S. counties *Orange County, Florida, containing Orlando *Orange County, Indiana *Orange County, New ...

with Beacon in

Dutchess County Dutchess County is a county in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2020 census, the population was 295,911. The county seat is the city of Poughkeepsie. The county was created in 1683, one of New York's first twelve counties, and later organ ...

. The Beacon terminal is located adjacent to

Beacon station Beacon station is a commuter rail stop on the Metro-North Railroad's Hudson Line, serving Beacon, New York. The station is heavily used by residents of Orange and Dutchess Counties who drive to the station. It is a wheelchair accessible stat ...

, also served by the Hudson Line. Both ferries are operated under contract from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Manhattan connecting buses

NY Waterway operates connecting bus service for ferry passengers on different routes in Manhattan.

Discontinued services

At various points in the past, NY Waterway has also provided ferry service to other destinations including LaGuardia Airport,

Newport Newport most commonly refers to: *Newport, Wales *Newport, Rhode Island, US Newport or New Port may also refer to: Places Asia *Newport City, Metro Manila, a Philippine district in Pasay Europe Ireland *Newport, County Mayo, a town on the ...

, Harborside, Liberty State Park,

Port Liberté A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

, Belford,

Sandy Hook Sandy Hook is a barrier spit in Middletown Township, Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States. The barrier spit, approximately in length and varying from wide, is located at the north end of the Jersey Shore. It encloses the southern en ...

, and Belmar, New Jersey.

References

External links

* {{Hudson County Transportation Network Transport companies established in 1986 Ferries of New Jersey Ferries of New York City Ferry companies of New Jersey Ferry companies of New York City Tourism in New Jersey Tourism in New York City Travel and holiday companies of the United States Water transportation in New York City Transportation in Hudson County, New Jersey Transportation in Manhattan Companies based in Hudson County, New Jersey Port of New York and New Jersey Tourist attractions in Hudson County, New Jersey Crossings of the Hudson River 1986 establishments in the United States 1986 establishments in New Jersey 1986 establishments in New York (state)