Torpoint Ferry

Cars, vans and lorries pay on the eastbound trip, from Torpoint in Cornwall to Plymouth in Devon, and cross back to Torpoint free. Solo motorcycles are the reverse: the 2025 toll order charges them £1.00 westbound, from Plymouth to Torpoint, and nothing eastbound. Foot passengers and pedal cyclists never pay.

Anything towed is charged at the same fare as the vehicle towing it. Quad bikes, trikes and motorcycles with a sidecar count as cars. The order also sets fares for three-axle vehicles and those with four or more axles, but notes that neither is currently carried, so the largest vehicle on the ferry is a two-axle vehicle over 3.5 tonnes.

The fare is taken on the ferry. Cash and card are both accepted, a collector reads a TamarTag with a handheld machine, and anyone paying cash is always given a receipt, which is worth keeping in case a notice ever arrives. Motorcyclists have been able to pay by card since 12 May 2025.

Be in the queueing lanes before the departure time, which is the moment the ferry leaves the slipway. Closing the gates and raising the prow take several minutes, and a vehicle judged to have arrived too late will not be called forward, even with space on board. Motorbikes and cycles queue in the priority lane with in-service buses and emergency vehicles, but only blue-light vehicles are loaded first; the rest take the next ferry with room in their stowage lane.

A routine crossing takes about 6 minutes over up to 650 metres, depending on the tide. Vehicles loaded on the north side at Torpoint come off first there, but at Devonport the south side unloads first, so the first car on can be among the last off.

Tamar Crossings accepts that some drivers cannot pay at the time and lets them pay later. Within five calendar days a supplement is added. For the ferry, the FAQ quotes £2.60, but the appeals guidance says the supplement equals the authorised car toll, now £3.00. Since both are current operator pages, check the amount due directly with Tamar Crossings. From day six a violation notice follows, adding a £60 administration fee to the fare, and civil recovery normally begins 29 days after the notice is issued.

The registered keeper can challenge the notice within 28 days of service, counted from when the post would normally deliver it. Representations go by email to tollappeals@tamarcrossings.org.uk, through the online form, or on paper to the Torpoint Ferry Office in Ferry Street, the same building that handles mobility passes. A late one may still be considered if illness or a holiday got in the way and you send proof, but forgetting is not accepted as a reason.

The six accepted grounds are that you were not the keeper on the day, that the fare had been paid, that the vehicle was exempt and the scheme rules were followed, that it was taken without consent, that the notice demands more than the toll order allows, or that it was a hire vehicle whose hirer signed a statement of liability. After a rejection you can appeal to the Governance and Finance Manager, and beyond that to Cornwall Council's Monitoring Officer or the Local Government Ombudsman on their own limited grounds.

The tag halves the car and goods vehicle fares, and the same account works at the Tamar Bridge. It costs 80p a month in administration, a figure unchanged since 2014 after the Joint Committee turned down a rise to £2 in June 2026. New applications are being taken by email and in person rather than online while tag deliveries catch up, with waits of up to four weeks reported.

Foot passengers and pedal cyclists travel free both ways, and a solo motorcycle pays nothing heading east. Disabled people can apply for a mobility pass, shared with the Tamar Bridge, that gives an annual allowance of 100 free crossings for a £5 fee. It is open to those receiving the higher rate mobility component of Disability Living Allowance, the enhanced mobility component of Personal Independence Payment or a war pension mobility supplement, and to registered blind people.

The pass holder has to be in the vehicle on every crossing that uses the pass, otherwise the full fare is charged and the pass can be kept. Passes last up to 3 years, or less if the benefit evidence expires sooner. Applications, with benefit evidence dated within 3 years, a passport photo and an A5 stamped addressed envelope, go by post to Mobility Applications at the Torpoint Ferry Office, 2 Ferry Street, Torpoint PL11 2AX.

Chain ferry service across the Hamoaze operated jointly with the Tamar Bridge under the Tamar Bridge Act 1998; fares revised with the bridge tolls (2019, 2022, 2025). Car fare rose from £2.60 to £3.00 (tag £1.30 to £1.50) from midnight 12 May 2025.

A formal ferry has run at Torpoint since 1791, when Reginald Pole Carew and the Earl of Mount Edgcumbe won Parliamentary approval for the first commercial service. In 1831 the engineer James Meadows Rendel introduced the first chain ferry, or floating bridge. The ferries ran on steam until 1960, the service stayed in private hands until Cornwall County Council bought it in 1922, and building the Tamar Bridge from 1959 to 1961 led to today's joint ownership with Plymouth.

Each ferry hauls itself across on fixed chains using two vertical chainwheels nearly 2 metres across, each with its own motor and a 1.6 metre hydraulic disc brake. The fourth-generation ferries of 1961 and 1969 were rebuilt and enlarged in 1986; in July 2003 the contract for their successors went to Ferguson Shipbuilders. Today's three ferries each take a nominal 73 cars, half as many again as the ships they replaced, and between them carry nearly two million vehicles a year, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, which Tamar Crossings calls the busiest estuarial vehicle ferry crossing in the UK.

Maintenance has taken one ferry out of service for extended spells in 2026. Tamar II was withdrawn from 8 September for an overhaul due at 40,000 engine hours, and Plym II from 21 September to replace an Integrated Platform Management System that had been in service for more than 20 years and reached the end of its life, along with gantry work. The programme is expected to finish by 30 October, and until then daytime ferries leave every 15 minutes from each side before the normal night service resumes.

Tamar Crossings aims to run at least 99% of scheduled crossings over 12 months, but warns that shipping movements, breakdowns on board or on the slipways, emergency fast crossings and ferries sailing as soon as they fill at busy times can all move departure times.

For a car the price is identical: £3.00 by cash or card or £1.50 with a TamarTag, eastbound only on both crossings. The bridge carries the A38 from Saltash and takes the three-axle and larger vehicles the ferry cannot, so it is the only choice for a lorry of that size. A solo motorcyclist crosses the bridge free in both directions, against £1.00 westbound on the ferry, but the bridge stops motorcycles when gusts reach 55mph.

Neither crossing receives money from the government or from Cornwall Council or Plymouth City Council; both are paid for by their users' tolls, which is why the ferry fare does not stop when services are reduced.

A few habits cost Torpoint Ferry users time or money.