Fulop proposes resuming ferry service, lowering fares in southern Jersey City

Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop, whose nascent gubernatorial campaign has made public transit a key focus, announced a new initiative today to restart ferry service out of Port Liberte, a ferry terminal in the southern Jersey City neighborhood of Greenville.

Fulop said that Councilwoman Denise Ridley will introduce a resolution next week awarding a contract to NY Waterway to operate the Port Liberte ferry, which connects Greenville and Lower Manhattan; the resolution would also lower fares from $13 to $8. The ferry has not run since March 2020, when NY Waterway suspended it due to the Covid pandemic; last year, Jersey City acquired the terminal in preparation for restarting service.

“We acquired the ferry terminal to have an active role in subsidizing rates and providing greater and more equitable access to critical transportation services that our residents from Greenville to Bergen-Lafayette need,” Fulop said in a statement. “We are exceeding our goals in closing transportation gaps and expanding our transit infrastructure through Via Jersey City, which we launched in 2020.”

Also included in Fulop and Ridley’s efforts will be enhanced transit service to get to the terminal, which is located more than a mile from the center of Greenville.

Fulop’s 2025 gubernatorial campaign already has the endorsement of the Amalgamated Transit Union, the nation’s largest public transit workers union. In accepting the union’s endorsement, Fulop highlighted his work to improve mass transit in Jersey City and said he would fight to do the same statewide.

“Modernizing New Jersey’s public transit system is one of our state’s greatest needs,” Fulop said. “I believe strongly that we need to think big on public transit to build a reimagined system that efficiently moves people to major job centers, takes cars off the roads to reduce traffic and fight climate change, and supports equitable economic development.”