PASSENGERS on the Hythe Ferry have reacted with shock to news the service to Southampton may be forced to close next winter.

Ferry bosses White Horse say they will not be able to keep the business afloat after that if they are made to pay soaring business rates.

The Daily Echo climbed aboard the Hythe Ferry to ask passengers what they thought about the threat to the popular service.

Richard Moody, 43, an engineer, from Fareham, said: "I use it every day for work and I would be stuck without it at the moment because I have smashed my collar bone and can't use my car. The traffic driving to Hythe is a nightmare anyway.

"It is very popular. It is difficult trying to get on it on a Saturday because it is so busy, especially when there is football on.

"It's quaint and about the only thing that Hythe has got going for it."

Hythe Marina resident Joyce Woodgate, 70, retired, said: "It would be a pity. I use it when I come shopping in Southampton. If it wasn't here I would have to drive and that would be more expensive to park. The ferry is very handy."

White Horse say they cannot afford to pay their latest business rates bill which has shot up by 740 per cent.

The service, which is heavily subsidised by the taxpayer, was already reeling from a fall in passenger rates after a dredger crashed into the pier in June 2003. The ferry was forced to operate from Hythe Marina for nearly ten weeks while the damage totalling £300,000 was repaired.

Ferry skipper Patrick Malkinson, 44, has been in the job for 20 years after taking on the post that his father had held for 30 years before him.

"We all hope it doesn't close," said Mr Malkinson, of Hillview Road, Hythe.

"It would be a shame if it went. People are only just starting to come back after the accident. It's been here a long time but at the end of the day it is a business and they can't keep it going if they can't afford to run it."

White Horse says a ferry service has operated in some capacity from Hythe to Southampton for at least the last 500 years.

Hythe pier was built in 1860 and its train holds a place in the Guinness Book of Records for being the oldest working pier train in the world.

It is also the seventh longest pier in the UK.