“Late again”: A deep dive on fast ferry rider alerts
A ferry passenger looks at their phone as the M/V Reliance docks at Pier 50 in Seattle.
Kitsap Transit’s customers rate us highly for the accuracy, relevancy and clarity of our rider alerts — but not so much for timeliness.
In a survey last September, 28% of the 515 respondents disagreed or strongly disagreed with the notion that fast ferry alerts for delays or cancellations were “sent in time for me to make decisions.” Another 22% neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement, while 50% agreed or strongly agreed that our rider alerts were sent in time to make decisions.
Dissatisfied fast-ferry riders weren’t shy about telling us what’s bugging them: They want earlier notice of ferry trip delays or cancellations.
“I once walked to the ferry dock and waited for half an hour before being told it was cancelled in person by staff,” wrote one respondent. “Then on the walk back home I got the text.”
It’s reasonable to expect Kitsap Transit to give advance notice to the public when we can’t operate sailings due to crew shortage, weather or mechanical issues.
However, there are legitimate reasons why we often issue alerts after a vessel’s scheduled departure time — read on for a look at the numbers and what’s going on behind the scenes.
Let’s preface this discussion with a huge thank-you to our fast-ferry crews for their tireless efforts to maintain a safe, reliable, on-time operation. In March, across all ferry routes, Kitsap Transit had nearly 100% reliability (4,066 sailings operated out of 4,072 scheduled) and 98% on-time performance. You can look up the statistics for your ferry route by visiting our Performance Indicators dashboard.
Rider alert response times
Based on the negative feedback we heard in September’s survey, we did a deep dive to answer a basic question.
How many minutes does Kitsap Transit take, on average, to notify the public when a fast-ferry trip is canceled or delayed? This “response time” is calculated by comparing the time we issued the rider alert with the time the ferry was scheduled to depart.
We looked at 107 fast-ferry rider alerts — 42 cancels and 65 delays — sent from January 24, 2024, through March 25, 2025. If an alert notified the public of multiple affected sailings, we used the time of the earliest sailing listed in that alert.
The average response time was 3 minutes before the scheduled sailing — a picture that doesn’t line up with the complaints.
The story here is what’s behind the average, says Kyle Bierly, our Research & Data Analyst. Bierly’s analysis is an example of how Kitsap Transit is using a wide variety of data sources to improve customer experience.
Of the 107 alerts, 62 (or 57%) were sent to the public before or at the time of the scheduled sailing, while 46 (or 43%) were sent after the scheduled sailing time.
Based on this, it’s no surprise the public might expect all fast-ferry alerts to be sent early.
“It would be beneficial for customers to know this information the night before,” wrote one Bremerton Fast Ferry rider whose morning sailing was canceled.
Pre-emptive notifications do happen when mechanical issues are severe enough that our crews know they can’t be fixed quickly. In some cases, there is no backup vessel or crew available to operate a route. In others, unsafe sea conditions force the crew’s hand.
But what about when the unexpected happens? A water jet clogs. A radar malfunctions. An engine monitor displays an error code.
“It’s a mechanical piece of equipment, with lots of complex systems,” explains Marine Services Director Raymond Scott. “If one of those systems goes, we can’t sail."
Behind the scenes: Fast ferry rider alerts
Under Kitsap Transit’s protocols, the crew has up to 20 minutes to try to resolve an issue before they must notify shore-side personnel — including the Marketing team — if the sailing is delayed or canceled.
During that 20 minutes, crew members do everything they can to diagnose and fix whatever is causing the delay.
“It could be anything,” Scott said. “At the end of the day, the crews don’t want to cancel a sailing unnecessarily and inconvenience the passengers.”
Once the crew notifies shore-side personnel, the Marketing team manually composes the alert in our rider-alert software and sends it. This includes alerts sent before 8 a.m. and after 5 p.m., when the team isn’t typically in the office. (Until March of this year, the Marketing team also had to copy and paste this information into a separate system for it to show up on our Rider Alerts webpage.)
After the Marketing team sends the alert, the data travels across the cellular networks, which may vary in how fast they transmit the message to the subscriber’s device.
What’s a “late” rider alert?
So if 43% of the rider alerts in the analysis were sent after the fast ferry’s scheduled departure time, should these all be counted as “late” response time?
Well, that depends on what you consider “late” — there is no industry-wide standard definition. In other words, it’s subjective.
This histogram of rider-alert response time shows how many times Kitsap Transit notified the public of fast-ferry trip cancels or delays before (negative minutes) or after (positive minutes) the scheduled sailing time of the first disrupted sailing.
On our Performance Indicators dashboard, we count our ferries as “late” if they arrive more than 5 minutes after their scheduled arrival. Applying that logic to our rider-alerts analysis, if we count alerts sent more than 5 minutes after a sailing’s departure time, then 36% of these alerts were “late.”
But if we count only those alerts sent more than 20 minutes after a sailing’s departure time — given the protocol the ferry crews follow — then just 11% were “late.”
Regardless of which yardstick you pick, late alerts are both frustrating and unavoidable. While we can’t magically prevent our boats from breaking down, we are trying to eliminate other sources of delay in notifying the public.
With SimplifyTransit, our new rider-alert platform, we plan to automate notifications of canceled trips and stop having to compose and issue these manually. Once our ferry crews notify shore-side personnel that a sailing is canceled, Kitsap Transit will issue a machine-generated alert with the click of a button.
A Kitsap Transit passenger receives a rider alert.
These alerts also will show up automatically on the Rider Alerts page of the Kitsap Transit website. (If you’re not signed up for rider alerts from our new platform, visit our website to subscribe and learn tips and tricks to get the most out of your subscription.)
When it comes to sailing delays, KT Tracker, a web tool powered by Clever Devices, will soon allow the public to see the locations of our ferries in real time. You won’t have to wait for a rider alert — you can look for yourself online.
Our real-time data feed also will allow third-party apps used by transit riders to see whether their sailing is delayed. This means if you’re waiting for our ferry to arrive in Seattle, you’ll be able to check the KT Tracker, Google Maps, Apple Maps, Transit, or other apps to see how far away your boat is and its expected time of arrival.
These new technologies will offer a significant improvement in the timeliness of rider alerts to our bus and ferry passengers — and, as the old saying goes, knowledge is power.