Provincetown Officials Tour Portsmouth, NH

CCB MEDIA PHOTO Provincetown Town Hall

CCB MEDIA PHOTO
Provincetown Town Hall

PROVINCETOWN – Provincetown officials were in Portsmouth, New Hampshire last week to meet with officials there and tour the community.

A Portsmouth group, Promote Our Port, is pushing to provide high-speed ferry service between the two communities.

Provincetown Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Candace Collins-Boden, who made the trip, likes the idea but says it is still years away.

“A lot is going on there right now and they are not quite ready but it will take a few years,” she said. “It looks like they are developing and that is a great thing and any kind of relationship directly between Portsmouth and Provincetown is good for both of us.”

The port area is currently undergoing a bridge construction project that will take several years.

“That will give them two years to form partnerships and plan what they are going to do to increase their public transportation venues and that includes a ferry service,” Collins-Boden said.

Collins-Boden said she had not been in Portsmouth for about 30 years and was impressed with what they have done to develop the city.

“They have a lot of public buildings and a lot of restaurants and they have a beautiful Sheraton there so the possibilities are endless in that port,” she said. “They have a lot of communities around them too, and they are not that far from Boston.”

Collins-Boden was joined by other officials from Provincetown including Harbormaster Rex McKinsey, Board of Selectmen member Cheryl Andrews and Assistant Town Manager David Gardner.

Collins-Boden said getting more visitors to town is always a plus for the economy.

“We are looking for any port that would be willing to start a ferry service that comes and visits us,” she said. “We love having people arrive via public transportation because we don’t have a lot of parking.”

Provincetown officials are on board with the possibility but know it will take time for Portsmouth to make the ferry a reality.

“I think that Portsmouth has a lot of work to do to accomplish this,” Collins-Boden said. “They would need a special sized ferry because it will be out in the ocean a bit. It’s quite a long run.”

The ferry trip would take about 2 hours and 15 minutes.

Promote Our Port chairman Bob Hassold hopes to have the service ready for the 400th anniversaries for Provincetown and Portsmouth in 2020 and 2023, respectively.

“We are trying to put both cities, or both towns, together to be able to extend the celebration of both communities,” Hassold said.

Hassold said the idea is popular in Portsmouth.

“There are many people here that are from Vermont, part of New York State, Quebec [and] Maine that want to use this service to go over to P-town and see what the place is like.”

By BRIAN MERCHANT, CapeCod.com NewsCenter

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