San Diego to Coronado Ferries to Sail Again

Ron May rode the ferry from San Diego to Coronado hundreds, maybe thousands, of times while growing up in this city of sun and water. It was something to do on a Friday night. Kids would sit in their cars on the lower deck and watch the bay lights twinkling. They would relax and take in the sea air, listen to the fog horns. On a foggy night the 10-minute trip through shrouds and veils could be thrilling. It only cost a quarter.

In 1965, a ferry ride was a cheap amusement indulged in by hundreds of thousands of San Diegans and Coronadans. It was also a way to get to work for many commuters. It is said that old-time San Diegans thought of the ferries the same way present-day San Franciscans think of their cable cars--a tradition that belonged to the people, not to be taken away.

“They were a major thing here then,” said May, who works as an archeologist for the county. “They were very popular, and people used the rides as entertainment. Sometimes the high school kids would get on in their cars, ride over to Coronado and come right back on the next trip. I’m one of the ones who didn’t like it much when the service was discontinued. I don’t believe most people favored the bridge over the ferry, but that’s just my opinion.”

The San Diego-Coronado Bay Bridge is still here, but people who loved the ferries have reason to smile because daily ferry service to Coronado is coming back after a 17-year absence.

On Tuesday the San Diego Unified Port Commission unanimously gave its nod to resumption of ferry service between San Diego and Coronado. It also approved construction of a $600,000 pier to be built on the Coronado shoreline.

Ferry service must still be approved by the state Department of Transportation and the state Public Utilities Commission--a process that could take six months to a year--but promoters do not anticipate any problems.

The proposal to renew ferry service and to build the new pier was presented by the Star and Crescent Boat Company, a company with a long history of plying the waters of San Diego harbor, which currently operates excursion cruises from a berth at the foot of Broadway.

Star and Crescent has development rights to build a $7-million shopping and restaurant complex in Coronado. Lloyd Schwartz, attorney for Star and Crescent, said the ferry is an important element in bringing tourists to the complex.

“The ferry is very much tied into the development on Coronado,” Schwartz said. “We would hope to attract tourists not only to our complex but to other attractions on Coronado. We also hope to provide another form of mass transportation. The trolley was well received here, and we hope the ferry will be welcomed back.

“It will also bring back nostalgia to San Diego. The ferry became a part of our historical heritage going back for 80 years. Those who have lived here for awhile would like to see it come back,” he said.

Star and Crescent has proposed two routes for the ferry. The main route would be from the Broadway berth to the new pier and would be geared primarily to tourists and bicyclists, who could use the ferry to complete a bike loop that winds around the southern half of San Diego Bay.

The second route would take commuters from the 24th Street Pier in National City to the North Island Naval Air Station. Schwartz said the ferry trips would cost about $1.50 each way. (The bridge toll currently is $1.20 to Coronado, nothing to San Diego.) Neither of the ferries would carry cars.

“We’re hoping to attract ridership from South Bay residents who travel to North island to work,” Schwartz said. “They would avoid the hassle and traffic on Interstate 5 and the waste of time on the Coronado Bridge. At the same time they would be able to sit down and read a newspaper, have coffee. It should be a pleasant trip.”

Trips on the ferries of yesteryear were pleasant indeed. There were men’s and ladies’ cabins, tea rooms, umbrellas to shade the riders from the hot sun.

Ferry service actually began in April, 1886, on a private yacht owned by Hampton L. Story, who along with Elisha Babcock Jr. bought the island of Coronado in 1885. “Della,” as it was named, served to carry men and equipment back and forth while Coronado was being developed.

According to San Diego Historical Society archives, the first “real” ferry--Coronado I--arrived in August, 1886, from a shipyard in San Francisco. It had a driveway down the center of the deck for teams of horses and wagons. This venerable boat was sold in the 1920s to a movie company which made the silent film “Captain Blood.” The ship was rebuilt into a replica of a Spanish Galleon and was ignobly blown up at the end of the film.

Its namesake, the Coronado II, launched in 1929, was the first diesel electric ferry to operate in the harbor. It could accommodate 46 autos and about 500 passengers. This boat made its last run in 1969, at the same time the Coronado bridge was completed.

Other ferries that survived countless dockings and journeys through murky fog ended up as floating dance halls, floating machine shops and floating abandoned hulls. One was taken on an Amazon journey, and one--the Morena--was used as a Navy training vessel.

Ferry service itself was as intrepid as the hardiest vessel, stopping only twice in its 83-year history; once in 1954 when crews went on strike for 16 days, and in 1960 when a Peruvian earthquake caused the waves to swell so much that the boats were secured for the rest of the day.

When the Coronado bridge was completed, competing forms of transportation, such as ferries, were banned by state law so that bonds used to finance bridge construction could more easily be paid off. But the bonds were officially paid off this year on April 1, much earlier than anticipated, clearing the legal hurdle to resume ferry service.

“The ferry was one of the high points of growing up in San Diego,” said Ron May. “I’ll be happy when I can take that ferry ride again.”