Bill De Blasio News

New York City is looking at ways to help shift freight transportation off of its busy roads and onto the waterways.The city's Department of Transportation (NYC DOT) and Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) on Wednesday jointly released a Request for Information and Expressions of Interest (RFEI) seeking private sector feedback to help it gauge industry challenges and opportunities, and explore ways to implement and support businesses to engage in waterfront freight operations.The initiative is part of NYC's "Blue Highways" program, launched under the city's previous mayor, Bill de Blasio.

The year just ended, 2021, might be described as being about “trying to get back to normal”, across the entire transportation spectrum, two years into the pandemic. During this time, the decarbonization and electrification waves have swept across maritime passenger transport. The passenger side of the business is dependent on multiple funding sources; increasingly, this money will be driven by environmental and social considerations.The long-awaited funding of “infrastructure”-related projects…

Eastern Shipbuilding Group, Inc. launched Dorothy Day, the third of three new Staten Island Ollis Class ferries, on Friday, March 26, at its Allanton shipyard in Panama City, Fla.The three 320-foot Ollis Class double-ended 4,500 passenger ferries are being built for the City of New York Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) Staten Island Ferry Division. Designed by Elliott Bay Design Group, each ferry features four ABS Electro-Motive Diesel (EMD) 12-710 at 900 rpm EPA Tier 4  marine…

Ridership on the new NYC Ferry system has far exceeded expectations, serving 5 million passengers since the service was launched in May 2017. Now, in response to the record-breaking demand, new larger-capacity ferries are being built for New York waters, the first of which, Ocean Queen Rockstar, has arrived in New York this week.Ocean Queen Rockstar, the first in a series of six new 350-passenger capacity vessels being built for the NYC Ferry fleet, completed sea trials and journeyed 2,200 nautical miles from builder Metal Shark’s Gulf Coast shipyard to New York Harbor earlier this week.

In operation for just three months, New York City’s new ferry service has already moved more than a million passengers. The new ferry service, NYC Ferry, commenced in May, serving Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn, with a Bronx connection scheduled for next year. Already, it is off to a great success with very high demand from riders. “We just broke one million rides on @ NYC Ferry….we’re changing the game for more New Yorkers,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted. The first two vessels were delivered only three months ago, and already it has expanded to 14 vessels with more on the way.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio today unveiled a series of initiatives aiming to spur 100,000 high-paying jobs over the coming decade across a number of sectors, including the City's maritime and intermodal freight and logistics industries. As part of the New York Works plan, the city will implement a multipronged strategy called Freight NYC that seeks to create 4,000 freight network industrial jobs by building more shipping and distribution infrastructure to connect NYC to the nation’s Marine Highway.

Innovative boats, unusual collaboration: Hornblower, Horizon, Incat Crowther and Metal Shark team up on one of the most significant newbuilding projects of the year. When New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio earlier this year announced the selection of Hornblower to operate as many as 20 ferries to connect a similar number of New York City neighborhoods, the magnitude of the award immediately outweighed the details of the contract. The vessels, intended to eventually form the backbone of a modern, comfortable and efficient urban ferry fleet, will also be New York City’s first city-wide ferry system in over 100 years. Now on track to launch in 2017, the news service is predicated on the on-time delivery of high tech, newbuild hulls now being constructed on the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Incat Crowther has designed a new fleet of vessels for Hornblower, the selected operator of New York City’s new Citywide Ferry Service. The undertaking announced by New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio will create a network of ferries serving the entire city by the end of 2018 with a focus on areas that are currently underserved by transit. The new service includes longer runs to the Rockaways in 2017 along with South Brooklyn and Astoria. Service to the Lower East Side in Manhattan and Soundview in the Bronx begins in 2018. Incat Crowther is already delivering production engineering to satisfy an aggressive build schedule at multiple shipyards, with at least a dozen boats scheduled to be delivered in 2017.

Horizon Shipbuilding, Inc., Bayou La Batre, Ala., has been awarded a series production contract with Hornblower to build new 149-passenger ferries for New York City’s new citywide ferry service set to begin in Summer 2017. The vessels are part of New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to connect the outer boroughs with inexpensive waterborne mass transit. The first ferries delivered will serve the South Brooklyn, Astoria and Rockaway routes next summer, with additional routes serving the Lower East Side and Soundview in the Bronx in Summer 2018.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that the Citywide Ferry Service is on track to launch in 2017, with the selection of Hornblower, Inc. as its operator. The new service, which will include up to 20 boats and connect 21 New York City eighborhoods for the price of a single subway ride ($2.75) is scheduled to be fully operational by 2018, and is estimated to carry 4.6 million trips per year across six routes. “For the price of a single subway ride, tens-of-thousands of New Yorkers are going to have a new public transit option linking them to jobs…

Like most of our Nation’s major urban areas, New York City is experiencing growing pains. The Big Apple’s rising population means surging needs for freight and services, which have made congestion a common reality for the city’s more than 10 million daily commuters. However, New York has long had a transportation ace in the hole – its geography and access to water. New York City is positioned on a series of islands right in the middle of New York Harbor, one of the world’s largest natural harbors.

Fleet Week New York (FWNY) now in its 26th year, is the city's time-honored celebration of the sea services. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio hosted a breakfast and press conference honoring Sailors, Marines and Coast Guardsmen at Gracie Mansion, May 22. The weeklong celebration is an unparalleled opportunity for the citizens of New York and the surrounding tri-state area to meet Sailors, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, as well as witness firsthand the latest capabilities of today's maritime services. The event paid homage to the hard work and dedication of the sea services and also served as an official welcome to those aboard the three U.S. Navy and two U.S. Coast Guard ships attending Fleet Week New York (FWNY).