! Alert

NYC Ferry will temporarily bypass Governors Island on Friday, April 19, 2024, from 10am-1:30pm. During this time, ferries operated by the Trust for Governors Island will run as scheduled. Click here for tickets and more information.

NYC Ferry will temporarily bypass Governors Island on Friday, April 19, 2024, from 10am-1:30pm. During this time, ferries operated by the Trust for Governors Island will run as scheduled. Click here for tickets and more information.

Blog

Wel­come aboard the newest fer­ry in New York Har­bor: Gov­er­nors 1

Jun 13, 2019 11:09 am

Our new pas­sen­ger fer­ry, the Gov­er­nors 1, is ready to set sail! Gov­er­nors 1 will serve 400 pas­sen­gers per trip between Low­er Man­hat­tan and Gov­er­nors Island, increas­ing our capac­i­ty to trans­port an addi­tion­al 1,000 pas­sen­gers per hour. The new ves­sel will offi­cial­ly go into ser­vice on week­ends begin­ning this Sat­ur­day, June 15 and will make trips between the Bat­tery Mar­itime Build­ing and Sois­sons Land­ing, increas­ing ser­vice to approx­i­mate­ly every 20 min­utes on Sat­ur­days and Sun­days dur­ing the pub­lic sea­son. The fer­ry will also serve both cur­rent and future ten­ants of the Island includ­ing stu­dents at the New York Har­bor School, res­i­dents and staff of the soon to open Low­er Man­hat­tan Cul­tur­al Council’s Arts Cen­ter at Gov­er­nors Island, along with sea­son­al cul­tur­al pro­gram­ming orga­ni­za­tions and vendors. 

Gov­er­nors 1 was built by Blount Boats, Inc., a fam­i­ly-owned ship­yard led by Mar­cia Blount, based in War­ren, Rhode Island and cel­e­brat­ing their 70th anniver­sary this year. 132 feet long and 40 feet wide, the sin­gle pas­sen­ger deck ves­sel is pow­ered by two 800 horse­pow­er engines and will trav­el at speeds up to 14 knots, short­en­ing dock to dock trav­el time between Low­er Man­hat­tan and Gov­er­nors Island to about five min­utes. It was built using 450,000 pounds of steel, mak­ing it rough­ly the same weight as the Stat­ue of Liberty! 

This month, stu­dents in the ves­sel oper­a­tions class at the Urban Assem­bly New York Har­bor School, locat­ed on Gov­er­nors Island, and their instruc­tors joined our fer­ry crew aboard Gov­er­nors 1 to shad­ow train­ing exer­cis­es. The stu­dents, all in their sopho­more year, have been engag­ing direct­ly with mar­itime oper­a­tors through­out the semes­ter as part of their hands-on cur­ricu­lum. To help illus­trate how a ves­sel like Gov­er­nors 1 gets ready for pub­lic ser­vice, Gov­er­nors Island staff and the crew took the stu­dents through all aspects of dai­ly oper­a­tions, includ­ing start-up pro­ce­dures in the engine room, man-over­board drills in the pas­sen­ger cab­in and even pub­lic ser­vice announce­ments from the pilot house. 

Thank you to the Har­bor School stu­dents, instruc­tors and Prin­ci­pal Jeff Che­tirko for help­ing to prep for Gov­er­nors 1’s maid­en voy­age across New York Har­bor. To learn more about the New York Har­bor School, vis­it newyorkhar​borschool​.org. See the new fer­ry sched­ule here. Wel­come aboard! 

Sign up for Our Newsletter