Posted online at 5:41 p.m. Thursday It may take awhile longer for Pierce County to get back the Steilacoom II, the vessel it’s leasing to Washington State Ferries for temporary use on the Port Townsend-Keystone route.

That’s because the only bid for a 50-car ferry that will be built to take over that route for the state ferry system came in almost $10 million higher than expected. State ferry officials are trying to figure out why and what to do next.

If they decide to throw out the bid and start over, the timeline for giving the Steilacoom II back to Pierce County could be extended.

“Our goal is to stay on the fast track,” said Lloyd Brown, spokesman for the state Department of Transportation. Even so, Brown conceded it might take longer than expected.

Todd Shipyards of Seattle said it could build the new vessel for $26 million. State engineers had figured the cost should be closer to $16.8 million. Bids were opened on Thursday, and Todd Shipyards was the only bidder.

Brown said DOT officials will evaluate the bid over the next few days before making a recommendation.

The new 50-car state ferry is designed after the Steilacoom II. The ferry system was hoping to get it built quickly and put it in service on the Port Townsend-Keystone (Whidbey Island) route by May 2009. In the meantime, the state is paying Pierce County about $700,000 to lease the county-owned Steilacoom II for 14 months.

But the waters on the Keystone run might be a bit too rough to have the Steilacoom-class ferries on that route permanently. So, the new Steilacoom replica would take over that route only until the state could build two other ferries, similar to the Island Home ferry, currently in service on the East Coast.

When the first of the Island Home ferries arrives, it would be put in service on the Port Townsend-Keystone run. And the state-owned Steilacoom II replica might be put into service on the Point Defiance-Vashon Island route, replacing the aging 48-car Rhododendron ferry that is now on that route.

“That would be a route it could definitely fit on,” said Hadley Greene, ferry system spokeswoman.

The new 50-car vessel also could be deployed on routes in the San Juan islands, Brown said.

Pierce County Public Works Director Brian Ziegler said the county rejected the first bid it got to build the Steilacoom II because it was way too high. The county asked for a new set of bids and ultimately paid about $12 million for the vessel, he said. That was in 2005-06.

Todd’s bid to build the Steilacoom II replica for the state was $25,985,125.

“While I am disappointed that the bid came in higher than our estimate, we will take a close look at the bid and keep moving forward to build a new 50-car ferry,” said David Moseley, new chief of the ferry division, said in a statement.

Construction of that ferry is scheduled to take approximately 12 months.

The revised state transportation budget that Gov. Chris Gregoire signed into law earlier this week provides money to build six ferries over the next four years.

Besides the Steilacoom II replica, the DOT plans to begin a separate process to get two Island Home-designed ferries, which will carry between 60 and 80 cars. Those vessels will replace the retired Steel Electric class ferries and could be in service by June and December 2010, respectively.

The DOT also is going to build three 144-car ferries, beginning construction on the first of those by next year. Those three vessels will be used systemwide. The first one will be in service by 2011.

Joseph Turner: 253-597-8436

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