Blue & Gold Fleet is a privately owned company in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

providing

ferry A ferry is a boat or ship that transports passengers, and occasionally vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A small passenger ferry with multiple stops, like those in Venice, Italy, is sometimes referred to as a water taxi or water bus ...

services in the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. It operates the San Francisco Bay Ferry commuter ferry system under contract with San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority (WETA). Blue & Gold also operates tourist and excursion services under its own brand from Pier 41 in San Francisco, with midday ferry service to Sausalito and a variety of tourist routes. The company is the Bay Area's largest ferry transportation provider and carries approximately 4 million passengers annually.

History

The Blue & Gold fleet was founded in 1979 by Roger Murphy, beginning excursion service from the West Marina of Pier 39 with three vessels. The company became the operator of the Alameda/Oakland commuter ferry (under contract with the City of Alameda) in 1991, the Vallejo ferry (under contract with the City of Vallejo) on July 1, 1994, and ferries to Sausalito, Tiburon, Angel Island, and

Alcatraz Alcatraz Island () is a small island about 1.25 miles offshore from San Francisco in San Francisco Bay, California, near the Golden Gate Strait. The island was developed in the mid-19th century with facilities for a lighthouse, a military fo ...

(all acquired from Red & White Fleet) in 1997. In 2006 the contract for the Alcatraz service was lost to Hornblower. In 2011 Blue & Gold won the contract to operate the consolidated San Francisco Bay Ferry system, which subsumed the Alameda/Oakland and Vallejo routes and over the following decade grew to include four other cross-Bay commuter routes. The company ended commute-hour service to Tiburon in 2017 and all service to both Tiburon and Angel Island in January 2022; these services were subsequently taken over by

Golden Gate Ferry Golden Gate Ferry is a commuter ferry service operated by the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District in San Francisco Bay, part of the Bay Area of Northern California, United States. Regular service is run to the Ferry Bui ...

References

External links

* Ferry companies of California Fisherman's Wharf, San Francisco Public transportation in San Francisco Public transportation in Alameda County, California Public transportation in Solano County, California Public transportation in Marin County, California Transportation in Oakland, California {{California-transport-stub