Yarmouth NS (Nova Scotia Canada)

Yarmouth is a historic seaport and town on Bay of Fundy (southwest Nova Scotia, Canada) with population around 7,000. Commercial lobster fishing is its main industry.

Through the 19th century Yarmouth developed a large wooden sailship building industry - in 1878 its shipbuilding tonnage per capita (453 vessels / total 166,623 tons) was world's largest. In the period 1874-1885, Yarmouth NS was Canada's second largest seaport - after Saint John NB. Some of Canada's largest wooden-hull sailing ships were built here - including "County of Yarmouth" (1884).

Shipbuilding declined in late 19th century as shipowners started re-investing their money into factories, steamships and railways. Iron-hulled steamships made Yarmouth a vital seaport connecting rail lines in Nova Scotia with US-homeported steamships (from Boston and NYC). Rail services to Yarmouth were gradually abandoned (1982 through 1990).

Tourism is among Yarmouth's main industries. Starting in 1880s, steamship companies offered "ship and train" travel package promos between Yarmouth and Boston-NYC, thus creating Nova Scotia's first tourism marketing. Steamship connections to Boston and New York were suspended with the start of WW2 (1939) and resumed after the war (1945). The Yarmouth-Portland (Gulf of Maine) passenger ferry service was started in 1978.

• In 1997, Bay Ferries Ltd won the bidding for the government-subsidized ferry service Yarmouth-Bar Harbor ME (crossing time 3,5 hours). The license and the right to primary use state-owned ferry terminals were transferred to Bay Ferries, but without a subsidy.
• In 1998 was introduced North America's first high-speed catamaran ferry "HSC Incat 046". In 2002, the ship was replaced with the larger "HSC The Cat", starting operations in 2003 with seasonal deployment here and winter deployment in the Caribbean.
• In 2006, HSC The Cat (1990-built, IMO 8903703) started the Yarmouth-Portland service, in addition to Bar Harbor. In Portland, the old ferry terminal was replaced by the new Ocean Gateway Terminal.
• The ferry service subsidy was provided in 2007-2008-2009, and was canceled for 2010-2014.
• In 2013, NS government requested proposals for re-establishing the Yarmouth-Portland ferry line, announcing a 7-year subsidy of USD 21 million (3 million a year). The bid was won by Nova Star Cruises in November 2013. Operations started on May 1, 2014, with MS Nova Star chartered for daily roundtrips Yarmouth-Portland. However, due to financial losses, Nova Scotia didn't renew the company's contract for 2016. In 2016, the subsidized ferry service was re-opened by Bay Ferries Ltd.
• Due to the COVID crisis, the Bar Harbor-Yarmouth service was suspended for a year (February 2021-2022).

On May 3, 2018, the port was visited by the Hurtigruten ship MS Fram operating on a 10-day cruise from New York to Halifax.

Yarmouth NS cruise terminal