For the past 30 years, the Gozo University Group, has been the voice for all Gozitan students studying in Malta. Our executive works tirelessly to facilitate the changes to the Gozitan students’ lifestyle, which could be challenging at times due to the constant travelling between the two Islands.
Our main aim has always been and will remain to make this change easier. Hence, kindly find hereunder our suggestions and ideas for the prospective fast ferry service, which would be extremely beneficial for all Gozitan students (and all Gozitans in general) who attend the various academic institutions in Malta.
Recently, GUG issued a survey to enquire about how much the Fast Ferry service would be popular among Gozitan students. Kindly find below some snippets of said survey:
This survey was responded by 181 respondents and it resulted that 90.6% of the respondents would find the service to be efficient should the commute take around 45 minutes. Moreover, 64.6% of the respondents will consider using public transport together with the fast ferry if shuttle services to and from the terminal are offered directly between Valletta-University, Valletta-MCAST, Valletta-Mater Dei and Valletta-Airport, while 10.5% responded “maybe”.
Should the whole commute, including the shuttle service take around 1 hour to complete, 68% would find this to be efficient.
On the other hand, 49.7% of the respondents prefer to rent a flat in Malta, 34.3% voted to commute daily and the remaining 16% responded by saying that they would consider commuting daily if it is cheaper and others depend on their university timetables.
One question regarded the days which the respondents are most likely to make use of the service and Monday (30.5%) and Friday (40.7%) were the most popular choices, while 22.6% of the respondents chose to commute daily. The question regarding the times preferred to make use of said service was responded by 146 respondents and their responses included different times from 5am to 10:30pm.
Finally, we also asked our audience whether the fact that cars cannot be boarded on the fast ferry deter them from using the service, to which we had 181 responses (54.7% voted no, whilst 45.3% voted yes). Although currently it seems that a large group of people (45.3% of our survey responders) still prefer to use their cars, we believe that if this service and the subsequent public transportation system is efficient and campaigns are done to promote this, said number would reduce even further.
Suggestions
First and foremost, for the fast ferry service to be of direct benefit to each Gozitan student, before devising any prospective timetable, one must keep in mind, that lectures start at 08:00am and finish at 08:00pm, from Monday to Friday but generally, the majority of students start their lectures between 08:00am and 10:00am and end between 04:00pm and 06:00pm.
Furthermore, to ensure that fast ferries are used by all students, irrelevant of their place of study, said fast ferries must arrive at their destination around half an hour before the start of every hour (for example every :30 of every hour – 7.30am, 8.30am, etc., etc.). This will ensure ample time for each student to travel from the fast ferry’s end destination to their respective place of study, in time for their lectures.
To ensure maximum sustainability, we also propose a shuttle bus service that takes students to the University of Malta and MCAST (and to other strategically important destinations). This will ensure that in around half an hour, students will arrive for their subsequent lectures, without any hiccups or delays.
This process would also apply for the return trip to Gozo. We suggest that for the return trip, the shuttle bus service departs from the respective place of study at around :10 of each hour (for example 2:10pm, 3:10pm etc., etc), since this would allow each student to arrive in time at the departing point of the shuttle bus and subsequently to the fast ferry, following their lectures.
Furthermore, we also suggest that each fast ferry would be equipped with a sustainable space for students to work during their commute and to ensure that the necessary charging points, USB ports and most importantly a solid and uninterrupted WI-FI connection are made available without any irrelevant algorithms, which are presently found in your competition.
Finally, the most important thing is pricing. We fully understand that a specialized service of the kind would not be cheap to run. However, we also feel that with the right attitude, planning and consultations, each trip would be profitable and sustainable. As a Gozitan, student organization we understand both sides of the spectrum. First, we would like each student to enjoy their educational experience to the full, however, we also feel the need for students to return to Gozo more regularly. We need a regular influx of young students to visit Gozo on a regular basis to ensure the post-COVID recovery is done right, and this could only be achieved by issuing a competitive rate for the fast ferry service, which could be afforded by all students.
The students’ income is that of €89 per month from their stipend, with which they must buy their academic apparatus, cater for transport and try to save up. Gozitan students have the additional allowance of €166 per month which is used to pay rent in Malta – which, despite the introduction of the fast ferries, most students still feel the need to rent.
We believe that schemes should be in place with which students can either buy monthly passes, yearly passes or else which offer several trips. The price for these schemes should take into consideration the limited income which the students have so that these would be more inclined to make use of the service.
Once again, we thank you for consulting us. We feel that this kind of regular consultation is vital for the betterment of this overall experience. Feel free to contact us soon for additional discussions.
Gozo University Group
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