Fares for commuters on the ferry service’s Pink Route are set to increase by 100 percent, announced Transport Minister Terry Lister yesterday.Speaking in the House of Assembly, he said the uplift would affect individual, day rates, monthly and quarterly passes. Regular bus and ferry tokens will no longer be accepted on the route and a special tokens will need to be purchased.Mr Lister said: “Prior to the 2010 summer ferry schedule the Department of Marine and Ports made a decision to decrease ferry services on the Pink Route to reduce [the amount] of time and operating costs of this service.”He said the route had been plagued by low ridership numbers and the Department was in communication with a privately operated entity who offered to take over the service, but “due to circumstances beyond the control of the department an [agreement] was not produced”.The Department reinstated the weekend and holiday services on June 27 after meeting with residents who agreed to pay a higher price for the fare. The Monday to Friday schedule has now been amended to include two extra trips at the Hamilton Terminal, one at 11am and another at noon.Shadow Public Works Minister Patricia Gordon Pamplin said the reduced schedule had “disadvantaged people, particularly guests of the guest houses that exist in the Salt Kettle area”.She said these guests “relied on the ferry and found it to be an effective and enjoyable means of transportation”.Ms Gordon Pamplin said residents had no objection to the fare uplift to reinstate full service, but said the doubling of ticket prices would hurt tax payers relying on the service to get to work.“It’s these people that are going to be most impacted that now have to say I am going to have to swallow a large cost.”She said the increase was particularly burdensome “at a time when the economy is putting increased constraints on their purse”.PLP MP Dale Butler said he joined forces with Mr Lister to hear concerns posed by residents of the Warwick and Paget area who relied on the Pink Route.He said the fee rise was the residents’ suggestion and was a compromise so “they have something as opposed to nothing”.Charlie Swan, of the UBP, said the “substantial increase” seemed “a bit punitive” towards the ferry users. He questioned why the former agreement with private entity was not put in place to provide them with a cheaper service option.OBA Leader John Barritt said it was hard to understand why the cost to travel from Warwick to Hamilton had become more costly than the journey from Rockaway in Southampton.“There is less distance to be travelled and fuel to be used,” he said.Mr Barritt also admitted it was bad situation “when you find a ferry cannot help people get to work early in the morning to make work on time.“You would think that would be a fundamental objective of a ferry service to attract riders.”Kim Swan, leader of the United Bermuda Party, applauded the reinstated ferry service and praised the Island’s transport system for providing service to a wide brush of the community.But said Paget residents and St George’s residents still didn’t have the kind of transportation services they needed.He said he understood the “difficulty in balancing the books” but said it made no sense to suspend service at a time when you are trying to boost rider numbers.Mr Swan said: “The answer is not doing without a service, but finding a way to encourage people out of their cars and into the ferries to up the ridership.”Government needed to find innovative ways to encourage people onto the ferries, he said.Minister of Youth, Families and Sport Glenn Blakeney said people in the west end has “a lot less arteries” in order to travel to the central parishes.As a result the ferry service appeared to be used more in Southampton and Somerset than some other parishes.He said it was only realistic that those services not heavily utilised would have to be reduced first. “If the consumer isn’t going to utilise it, it doesn’t make a difference how much effort you put into the branding.“It is about changing attitudes which is the only way to change behaviour.”Shadow Education Minister Grant Gibbons, who is a Paget MP, said on one hand he was pleased Mr Lister had responded to the concerns of residents.He said some of the small guest houses in the area had “long-stay visitors that were really dependent on the ferry service”. But said the fee increase was penalising service users, he said.“It’s a little bit unfair to stick it to Paget and Warwick by doubling the fares,” he added.Dr Gibbons joked with the Transport Minister and said: “I do hope this additional fare is not to boost his trips to Cape Canaveral the other day. This isn’t the way to balance the budget to pay for a wonderful weekend in Florida to watch a space shuttle take off.”Shadow Finance Minister Bob Richards questioned why the Island’s ferries were not run by two crew members instead of three. He also said many people were not able to use the Island’s ferry system as there was a limited amount of parking available, including in the Paget/Warwick area.Mr Lister admitted his Ministry did not talk to all 6,000 residents in the Paget and Warwick area, but it did its best to accommodate the major service issues in relation to the Pink Route.He said he heard from one resident who planned to boycott the service, but said a better solution would be to promote it to family and friends. If more people are riding the route perhaps the Ministry could eventually get a larger ferry or reduce the fare, he said.