Strait crossing sold as tourist attraction

By PAM GRAHAM

Toll Holdings is trying to turn the Cook Strait ferry trip many New Zealanders associate with sick bags into a tourist attraction.

The Australian company is planning to invest $4 million to turn the Arahura ferry into a "Queen of the Sounds" with a new interior, paint job and logo.

It will put more tourist and onward travel services into terminals and is promising activities for kids as they wait for ferries.

Toll is taking on those who knock it for being foreign by saying it is investing in New Zealand services.

"Preconceived ideas may have led many to believe that Toll, being an Australian company, may diminish the Kiwi identity of the ferries," a briefing provided to the Herald said. "Our intention, however, is the complete opposite."

The Cook Strait ferries will be promoted as a "must do trip" for tourists and a nostalgic escape for New Zealanders.

The company is hoping to have a new-look Arahura in service before the peak Christmas period.

Toll bought 84.2 per cent of Tranz Rail last year and has rebranded the company Toll NZ.

It got a road transport and ferry business with rail and has since bought a stevedore business in Auckland and announced a stevedore joint venture with Port of Tauranga.

Toll has already stunned 50 cooks and stewards on the Arahura with plans to change work conditions.

The company said the Interisland Line had some of the most experienced seafaring crew in the world but the lines of responsibility needed work, as did the hospitality service onboard. Decisions are still to be made on the freight side of the interisland business.

Bylaws enforced by Marlborough District Council and terminal facilities limited the choice of ships but Toll executives have been in Europe looking at options.

About one million passengers, 230,000 cars and freight filling 2 million lane metres of road and rail space cross the strait and cruise up through the Marlborough Sounds to Picton each year.

The Interisland Line operates four vessels, the Arahura and Aratere ferries, the seasonal Lynx fast ferry and the freight ship Purbeck.