Ferry or Bridge?

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Ferry or Bridge? installs straight from your browser — no app store.

iPhone: Share → Add to Home Screen. Android: menu ⋮ → Install app.

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Get a notification during your travel times when going round is quicker, the queue gets long, or ferries are taken out of service. Only when something changes — never more than your daily limit.

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What is Ferry or Bridge?

30-second intro. Share it with anyone who uses the Torpoint Ferry.

Why this app exists

Ferry or Bridge? was built in Torpoint to help commuters make an informed choice each day: join the ferry queue, or drive round by the bridge. But the bigger purpose is the record it keeps.

Every minute the app logs the length of the ferry queue, the number of ferries running, the operator's notices and the waits people actually experienced. Over months that becomes something the Rame peninsula has never had: an independent, continuous measure of how well, or how poorly, this crossing serves the people who depend on it.

The ferry has linked Torpoint and Devonport since 1791 and is the world's busiest chain ferry, carrying up to two million vehicles a year; the University of Plymouth calls it “a vital lifeline across the River Tamar”, saving a 28-mile detour for a three-mile crossing¹. The councils' own study brief describes it as “the vital link” for the peninsula and found that 8.6% of Plymouth's entire workforce crossed the Tamar daily². Yet the three ferries are over 20 years old and approaching the end of their planned service life¹, and when one is out for repair the service drops to two: the operator’s own notices this autumn have reported queues of 45 minutes at peak⁴, and a breakdown in 2023 pushed waits to an hour on both sides³. The current two-ferry running has been in place, on and off, since December 2025⁴.

Connectivity is the economy for Torpoint's 9,000 residents⁵ and the villages behind it. Every job in Plymouth, every appointment at Derriford, every delivery and every customer on this side of the water depends on a crossing that runs often enough to rely on. When the service drops and the queue reaches 45 minutes, people tell us they change their hours, their routes and sometimes their jobs; that is exactly the kind of impact the record should show, rather than assert. Decisions about the ferry's future, its frequency and the investment it needs (the Tamar 2050 programme is choosing the next ferries now¹) should be made on evidence, not anecdote.

If you help log the data by using the app and reporting your real waits, we can take that evidence to our local MP, Cornwall Council and Plymouth City Council and make the case, with numbers, for the economic impact of the current service and for the investment a higher-frequency crossing needs.

Support us

Help build the case for a better crossing. Three things make a difference:

1. Use the app and report your waits — every real wait you send (below) is a data point nobody else is collecting.
2. Add your name to the count. We'll use the number of supporters, never your details, when we write to decision-makers. Leave an email only if you'd like to hear when we do.
3. Share it with anyone who crosses the Tamar from this side.

The data is open: queue readings (CSV) · reported waits (CSV) · queue history. Emails are used only for updates about this campaign, are never shared, and are deleted on request.

Tell us how long you actually waited

Your real waits make the estimates better for everyone.

Accuracy check

Two checks: how often the app’s boarding-time predictions matched when the queue actually cleared (last 7 days), and the operator’s own queue posts next to the camera estimate at that moment.

How it works

• Queues: about every 30 seconds the app reads Tamar Crossings’ waiting-area cameras at Devonport and Torpoint. It knows where each queuing lane is (10 car lanes at Devonport, 6 at Torpoint; the bus and bike lanes are not counted) and whether cars are in it. Lanes are filled one at a time at the traffic lights, so it reports how many lanes are full and which one is filling. Tamar Crossings say about 3½ lanes make one ferry load at Devonport and about 4½ at Torpoint, which gives the number of ferries ahead of you; the wait is then timed against the departure interval for the number of ferries running, with any queue notice from the operator as a floor. When the queue runs out of the yard the cameras can’t see it, so TomTom traffic reports for the approach roads and the operator’s notices fill the gap.
• Service: ferries in service and notices come from Tamar Crossings’ public status pages.
• Roads: driving times from OpenStreetMap routing. The bridge route avoids the ferry; the ferry route adds queue + about 6 min crossing + boarding.
• Tolls: both the bridge and the ferry charge eastbound (into Plymouth) and are free westbound, so cost rarely changes the answer.
• Privacy: your start and end points are sent only when you press “Ferry or bridge?”, and the app remembers your last journey on your phone so you don’t have to retype it. Nothing about you is kept on our server unless you turn on alerts, which saves that journey’s start and end points so we can check it for you; turning alerts off deletes them. Wait reports and supporter sign-ups are stored without your name unless you choose to leave an email. We keep a copy of the operator’s public camera picture about every 10 minutes in daylight, for up to a week (longer if someone has checked it), to verify the lane count. No accounts, no ads, no tracking. Full details and your rights: Privacy & terms. To be removed from anything, email hello@ferryorbridge.co.uk.

Independent app — not affiliated with Tamar Crossings, Cornwall Council or Plymouth City Council. Estimates only: always follow signs and staff instructions. Privacy & terms · hello@ferryorbridge.co.uk.