Planning Your Travels:

While Current Conditions is a real-time planning tool that helps customers make informed travel decisions, the information related to deck space availability by sailing can change rapidly from sailing to sailing. Here is what you should know:

How do we calculate Estimated Deck Space Available?

Estimated Deck Space Available is the approximate percentage of vehicle deck space that remains available for sale on a particular sailing. It is calculated after counting the number of reservations booked in advance and the number of drive-up customers already checked in at the terminal. This percentage changes as more vehicles are processed through the ticket booth.

Around 10–20% of customers do not check-in for their bookings. After the booking check-in window closes, which is around 30* minutes before departure, we free up these spaces for drive-up customers.
*Some exceptions apply, find and review the check-in and cut-off times at your departure terminal.

Space estimated can also change depending on the size of vehicles that show up for a sailing, and how the vessel is loaded.

Sailing Waits – What can I expect?

With the Coastal Celebration currently out of service on our Tsawwassen – Swartz Bay route we have moved all of the customers bookings on those sailings to alternate sailings throughout the day. Moving these bookings provided customers that pre-planned and made an advance booking with confidence they could travel on the day they planned.

With 8 less sailings on this route per day, and reservations sold out for most sailings, it can appear at times as though we are full for the rest of the day. The number of non-reserved customers that we can load differs from sailing to sailing, as the ships and vehicles we load are different sizes.

While the Coastal Celebration is out of service, customers arriving at the Tsawwassen or Swartz Bay terminals without an advance booking could expect a 1-3 sailing wait.

Why do the cameras show an empty lot, but Estimated Deck Space Available indicates the sailing is full?

Estimated Deck Space Available includes advanced vehicle bookings. In most cases, these customers can check-in up to 30 minutes* before their sailing. If customers have a booking but haven’t yet arrived, the terminal lot may appear empty. As mentioned, with the Coastal Celebration out of service and bookings moved to alternate sailings, there are high volumes of reserved customers that will arrive between 60-30 minutes prior to the sailing.
*Some exceptions apply, find and review the check-in and cut-off times at your departure terminal.