Montgomery County has agreed to pay $1.5 million to acquire the landing at White’s Ferry in hopes that public ownership will help reopen the Potomac River shuttle.

Local officials announced the deal during a press event Friday in Dickerson, and expressed hope that they could reach an agreement to restart the shuttle with the landowner on the Virginia side of the river or local officials in the Commonwealth.

Both commuters and business people have lamented the loss of the ferry, a vital artery for Poolesville and other communities along the river.

The ferry closed in 2020 during a legal dispute between landowners on the Maryland and Virginia sides of the river who control where the ferry landed.

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Ownership of the landing in Dickerson and ferry operations later changed hands. But the new owner , Virginia-based business executive Chuck Kuhn, said he’s been unable to reach a deal with his counterparts in Loudoun County.

Kuhn has donated the ferry operations — valued at $7 million, he said — to the county, and sold the county his land along the shoreline for $1.5 million, which he said was “greatly reduced” from its appraised price.

Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich said at Friday’s event that negotiations over White’s Ferry have been unnecessarily difficult, though not because of anyone in Maryland.

“It’s not because we didn’t have partners who wanted to get this job done. We had a little obstacle on the other side of the river,” he said.

This is a developing story.