Memorial Day is this weekend and the Triangle Route is a mess. It’s down to two boats due to the fact that the Kitsap — the ferry system’s usual relief vessel — broke a crankshaft on Sunday on the Seattle-Bremerton route.

As the only route with three boats, the Triangle is the route that loses when a boat breaks, and the 90-car Sealth was moved to replace the Kitsap Sunday morning. According to a Monday Kitsap Sun article, three of the system’s other boats that could have filled in are undergoing routine maintenance and will not return to service until next week.

The triangle’s two-boat schedule will last “an indefinite amount of time,” and Washington State Ferries spokesman Ian Sterling said the system will hopefully have something figured out by the end of the week.

But “hopefully” is not going to cut it. Islanders are tired of waiting hours for a boat, seeing it leave with empty spaces and having commutes take far longer. It’s time to voice concerns to the state. Legislators have only given the ferry system enough funding for one relief vessel (one extra to be used in situations such as the one presented on Sunday). If that vessel is already being used on another route or breaks down itself, the Triangle Route gets cut. This needs to change.

“There are 22 vessels in the system and they’re all doing something, be it running routes or scheduled maintenance,” Sterling said Tuesday. “Situations like this illustrate how fragile the system is.”

There is a reason the Triangle has three boats. There are three destinations and most of the day-to-day traffic is hundreds of commuters that rely on the boats not for vacations, but for their livelihoods. Legislators need to rethink the decision to fund only one spare boat and should allow for more boats to be kept in the system for situations that are happening more often and at the busiest times of the year.

The Washington State Ferries system is touted as being the largest in the nation. It needs to be treated as such. With 23 million people riding the ferries each year and 20 terminals located on nine routes throughout Puget Sound, the aging and constantly bustling fleet requires regular repairs, as well as occasional emergency attention. One backup vessel is not cutting it. Contact your state lawmaker, Sen. Sharon Nelson, at sharon.nelson@leg.wa.gov or 360-786-7667, and encourage her to convey the importance of the ferry system on the Triangle Route to her fellow senators.