Locals raise red flags over proposed right whale protections that would impede high-speed ferry routes to Nantucket

Legislators and island residents say the change would harm the island’s economy and way of life.

Proposed protections of right whales by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), if imposed, would impede high-speed ferry services to Nantucket for over half the year, which opponents of the regulations say would stifle the local economy, safety, and health of the island’s residents who depend on the service.

Impacts would include cancellation of many ferry roundtrip routes, and the stifling of day trips off the island for commuting, medical care, and school sports events, they say.

The proposed regulations are in the final stage of being presented to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, which is currently taking public comment. The office must also sort through 90,000 public comments submitted to NOAA regarding the amendments.

According to U.S. Rep. Bill Keating, who represents the Cape and Islands, the office is expected to decide in the next two to three weeks.

“What’s on the scales here?” asked Keating.

He said protecting the right whales is one side of the issue. On the other hand, restricting ferry service will cause serious economic, public safety, or healthcare-related interruptions to the island.

Keating said that NOAA uses a model based on acoustic buoy information not backed by evidence-based information. He said there is no evidence that right whales have “ever” been spotted in Nantucket Sound.

“You weigh those two things — out of a lot of the issues we deal with, this one is clear cut,” Keating said.

Current regulations require vessels 65 feet or longer to travel at most 10 knots (11 mph) in designated seasonal management areas, and request that all vessels transit at 10 knots or less if a right whale is spotted outside those zones.

The amendments would expand the speed restrictions to include vessels 35 feet or longer and increase the size of the slow zones across the eastern coast, including Nantucket Sound, where the ferry service transits.

The proposed amendments will also create a “dynamic speed zone” to implement mandatory speed restrictions when right whales are detected outside the designated areas.

The stricter regulations follow NOAA’s efforts to save the endangered large whale species, which has experienced more deaths than births in the past several years. According to NOAA, about 360 right whales remain, including fewer than 70 reproductively active females.

The largest threats to species include entanglement in fishing gear, vessel strikes, and climate change, which may alter the whale’s migratory patterns and feeding areas.

In response to residents’ outcry over the proposed amendments, NOAA said in a statement that it remains “dedicated to recovering and conserving North Atlantic right whales” by using various techniques to study, protect and recover the endangered species.

“We love the whales, but they are not on our north shore,” said Brook Mohr, a member of the Nantucket Select Board, who worries about the consequences of the new regulations on the local economy.

The restrictions would impact Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard ferry services from Nov. 1 to May 30.

According to the Steamship Authority, if the speed restrictions are implemented, it would require the authority to eliminate 33% of its year-round traditional ferry roundtrips and its high-speed service during its early spring and fall operating schedules to Nantucket.

The proposed speed reductions in Vineyard Sound would require the Authority to reduce 14% of its traditional ferry roundtrips to Martha’s Vineyard.

The loss of ridership will impact the Steamship Authority’s revenue, which would most likely lead to fare increases.

“To place speed zone restrictions on waterways physically blocked by land masses from where the whales are situated would be impractical, unreasonable, and utterly burdensome to vessels operating in those waters,” wrote Robert Davis, the general manager of the Steamship Authority in a letter to NOAA.

Keating says that Buzzards Bay, Long Island Sound and waterways outside of New York City are exempt from the new regulations.

The economic implications of these regulations could be more than $100 million, which he thinks is worth looking into an exemption for.

Mohr said that without the high-speed ferry service, the island would experience impacts on islanders’ lives beyond the tourist season, which hosts the daffodil weekend and the Christmas stroll.

Some immediate changes would include making it impossible for many islanders to receive off-island medical care day trips, limiting mutual aid responses to safety emergencies, no longer allowing school athletic teams and clubs to participate in off-island sporting events, and impacting the hundreds of daily commuters from Hyannis to Nantucket.

The only way to the island is by sea or air, and with flight prices only rising, Mohr says if the restrictions go into effect, it would be impossible for some to commute.

“We are wholly dependent on (the ferry) service for our lives here,” said Mohr.