{"id":363145,"date":"2026-01-10T18:10:05","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T18:10:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/363145\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T18:10:05","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T18:10:05","slug":"swansea-to-southwest-england-ferry-proposal-gets-public-approval","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/363145\/","title":{"rendered":"Swansea to southwest England ferry proposal gets public approval"},"content":{"rendered":"

But there are questions about where a ferry would berth, how much investment would be needed to update port infrastructure, whether public support would translate into bookings, and how the ferry would attain zero-carbon emission credentials.<\/p>\n

The consultation findings have not yet been made public, but the council said the maritime company that carried it out – Ocean Prime – had progressed work on an interim business case.<\/p>\n

Last week it emerged that Devon County Council had not held any meetings with its Swansea counterpart about a hydrogen-powered ferry proposal in the past two years, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Referring to the Ocean Prime consultation work, a spokesman for Swansea council said: “Detailed technical and commercial concept assessments have identified some strong opportunities. The feasibility of these opportunities will be undertaken in the coming months to understand how they might be included.”<\/p>\n

He added: “Ocean Prime has met several other regional council experts, including harbour masters, since they first became aware of the project in 2023.<\/p>\n

“This has included exploratory talks about various aspects of a ferry concept with North Devon Council, Somerset Council, and Torridge District Council.<\/p>\n

“Now that market testing has been carried out in the Swansea area meetings will be arranged between Swansea Council, Ocean Prime, and councils in southwest England to further explore feasibility.”<\/p>\n

Ocean Prime chief executive Dave Sampson has previously described the plans for a ferry link as “very early days” and said gauging demand for the service was key.<\/p>\n

He said he envisaged a ferry around 55m (180ft) long which would take passengers, cars, and some cargo at speeds of up to 40 knots (46mph).<\/p>\n

He also said the intention would be for a ferry service to operate as often as possible rather than just during the summer months.<\/p>\n

In 2010, a proposed new fast ferry linking Swansea and Ilfracombe in north Devon, called Severnlink, came close to launching but was hit by funding difficulties.<\/p>\n

Last June, Swansea council responded to a Freedom of Information request by a former Swansea councillor about the cost of the Ocean Prime consultation. The council said it had paid the company \u00a324,995 and had not allocated any further money towards the project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But there are questions about where a ferry would berth, how much investment would be needed to update…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":363146,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-363145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=363145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/363146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=363145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=363145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=363145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}