Halifax Transit Ferries Schedules 2026

Halifax Transit runs two ferry services across Halifax Harbour, and both are ordinary municipal transit rather than excursions: the same $3 adult fare as the bus, free transfers, and under-13s travelling free.

Two services, two calendars

Alderney links downtown Halifax with downtown Dartmouth every day of the year except Christmas Day, New Year's Day, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Woodside runs Monday to Friday only — no weekends, no holidays. Both crossings take 12 minutes.

The ships are named after people

Halifax Transit dedicates each ferry to a figure connected to the region, and the list reads as a compressed history of Nova Scotia. Vincent Coleman stayed at his post during the 1917 Halifax Explosion to warn an inbound train, and was killed doing it. Viola Desmond ran a beauty parlour on Gottingen Street and was detained in 1946 for sitting in the whites-only section of a cinema. Rita Joe, a Mi'kmaq poet who attended the Shubenacadie residential school, was known as the poet laureate of her people. Craig Blake was the first Canadian sailor killed on duty in Afghanistan, from the bomb-disposal Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic based in Halifax. Christopher Stannix, a master corporal from Cole Harbour, was killed there in 2007.

Fares

A single ride costs $3 for adults, $2.25 for seniors and youths, and nothing for children under 13. A monthly pass is $90, or $66 concession; ten rides are $27. Paper transfers stay valid for 90 minutes and can be used travelling either inbound or outbound. Riders 65 and over travel free every Tuesday from 10 a.m. to 3.30 p.m. and after 6 p.m., on the ferries and the buses alike.

Boarding

Passengers enter the waiting area one at a time so security can keep an accurate count. Halifax Transit also asks that you tell staff if anyone in your group might need extra help in an emergency — its own definition being anyone who could not reasonably be expected to follow crew instructions.

The Mill Cove project

A third service is in development, to Mill Cove in Bedford, using high-speed zero-emission electric ferries carrying 150 passengers on single-deck hulls designed to run fast while limiting wake. Phase two is funded at $260 million across all three levels of government and covers the Mill Cove terminal, a replacement Halifax Ferry Terminal, a maintenance facility and a bridge over the CN rail line — both terminals net-zero, under the municipality's HalifACT 2050 target of 75% lower emissions by 2030. Service is expected in the 2027/28 fiscal year. The municipality noted in September 2024 that, contrary to some reports circulating, no contract had yet been awarded for the vessels or the infrastructure.

Two ferries, two entirely different services

Halifax Transit runs two harbour crossings and they are not interchangeable. The Alderney ferry operates every day of the year except Christmas Day, New Year's Day, Good Friday and Easter Sunday — four days, named. The Woodside ferry runs Monday to Friday only and does not sail at weekends or on holidays at all. A visitor planning a Saturday crossing to Dartmouth has exactly one option, and it is not Woodside.

Twelve minutes, every fifteen

Both crossings take about 12 minutes and run at 15-minute intervals through the working day — Alderney departures at :00, :15, :30 and :45, Woodside offset to :07, :22, :37 and :52. The offset is deliberate: the two lines share the Halifax terminal, so their arrivals interleave rather than collide.

Fares are transit fares, not ferry fares

The ferry is part of the city's transit network and priced accordingly: a single ride is $3 for adults (18–64), $2.25 for seniors (65+) and youth (13–17), and free for children under 13. Ten rides cost $27 and $20.25 respectively. Tickets work on buses and the ferry alike, and can be bought through the HFXGO app or at retailers and customer service centres.