To the Editor:

While the SSA may be proud about being self-funded through bonding arrangements and its own farebox, penny-pinching by the SSA has resulted in the recent purchase of several retired vessels to be refitted, and an obsolete computer reservation system. Financial concerns dominate the SSA’s goal to maximize its freight volume to Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket through its existing freight ports, no matter what the burden of that freight volume on Falmouth and Barnstable residents.

Non-time-sensitive materials going to and from Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket need to be placed on vessels before those materials cross the already congested canal bridges. Those materials leaving the islands include solid waste, demolition (a disturbingly high volume of all trash leaving the islands), and recyclables, as a recent workshop led by the Nantucket Select Board discussed.

While the SSA has been receptive to licensing third-party freight carriers to and from Nantucket by barge, licensing for third-party shippers to the Vineyard from other mainland ports is proving nearly impossible due to the SSA board’s protectionist stance. Please consider The MV Times’ Dec. 1 article (“New Bedford freight company proposes Vineyard expansion”) where Mr. Malkin voiced concerns about 41 North Offshore’s proposal taking away truck revenue from the SSA. According to a memo from SSA management, SSA senior staff recommend no further negotiations with New Bedford’s 41 North Offshore for establishing an additional mainland freight route to the Vineyard.

The burden of freight trucks on Barnstable and Falmouth neighborhoods keeps rising. Heavily loaded trucks to the Vineyard are too heavy to stop at our children’s school bus stops along Woods Hole Road. The SSA increasingly schedules trucks in the predawn hours, ignoring the health impacts of sleep deprivation on our residents. In 2020, 59,322 trucks passed through Woods Hole to and from the Vineyard. That freight truck volume has increased 39 percent since 2012. The number, size, and weight of the freight trucks in Barnstable and Falmouth continues to grow.

Public transportation is expensive and essential. This is the reason many states have subsidies for such public service sectors as maritime freight traffic. It is time for the Massachusetts legislature to step in and subsidize the SSA and other third-party freight shippers in order to strengthen regional planning and cooperation. An expansion of freight routes to the islands will only strengthen freight lifelines to the islands through support for a healthy diversification of mainland ports and carriers. Adding hybrid vessels and dedicated charging stations are needed. Monopoly operations like the SSA are no longer viable or desirable.

We must work out island and portside common ground well before voting agendas are set up. We owe it to ourselves to secure our best possible mutual social, health, and economic lives.

 

Suzanne Kuffler
Woods Hole