Grand Princess -- no central staircase?

[macandlucy]

Hi, hope someone can help answer this. We are new to Princess and have just booked cabin on Deck 11 on the Grand Princess. I chose it because it's, as it appears on the deck plan, close to the mid-ship staircase.

 

In reading some posts about the Grand this morning, I came across a couple that mentioned the lack of " a central staircase" or "no central staircase beyond deck 7".  

 

Could someone please clarify this for me? Is there a set of elevators and a staircase mid ship on deck 11? Or is it just for and aft? Or is it just deck 7 that lacks the mid ship stars? Or are "central staircase" and "midship staircase" different things?

 

It's important to us to be close to stairs, so I am now wondering if we have to change cabins. 

 

Thanks

 

 

[cr8tiv1]

Only on the Grand Princess:  Stairs to nowhere (crew only).  Mid ship stairs only go from Deck 4 to Deck 7.  There are mid-ship elevators that go all the way up to Lido Deck.  If stairs are necessary, best to book aft or forward cabins.  

 

I believe they fixed this problem on the Majestic. 

[macandlucy]

Thanks so much for that info. 

[Thrak]

Even knowing in advance that the central staircase was closed off we found ourselves (twice!) "discovering" that we couldn't continue up the stairs. We just laughed at ourselves and went another way.

[skynight]

Grand, Coral, Island have no center staircase for passengers. All other Princess ships do.

[RMMariner]

Our first cruise was on the Grand. Probably went up these stairs a half dozen times before we finally got the layout of the ship down and stopped thinking we could could use them to go up to Lido. Newer ships seem to have solved this.

[Cruise Raider]

As others have noted, there are no midship stairs for passenger use on the Grand Princess ... but they do have midship elevators.  With fuller capacity, we've found that the area you have to walk by the photo gallery often bottle necks when you are walking along deck 7 to go midship from the aft stairs.  We never found it an issue when we used to forward stair well, though.  And, with the current reduced capacity, we also haven't found the bottle necks to be problematic.  

The other minor issue with the Grand is that the stateroom closets are smaller as are the in room safes.  

For the positives, the crew / staff is phenomenal.  Alfredos is a huge plus in my book, too.  It went through a nice refurbishment during the pandemic.  The bedside lamps all have usb ports in them .. nice little touch, IMO.  

 

[cruisingrob21]

On 2/12/2022 at 4:26 PM, skynight said:

Grand, Coral, Island have no center staircase for passengers. All other Princess ships do.

No, that's not quite true.  The Coral and Island have a central stairway, but their forward stairtower only goes as low as deck 7 - its all crew area below deck 7 forward on those ships.

[skynight]

If my memory is still there believe the Coral and Island have center passenger staircases that go from decks 5 to 8. Their panoramic elevators also only travel between those decks.

[Steelers36]

1 hour ago, cruisingrob21 said:

No, that's not quite true.  The Coral and Island have a central stairway, but their forward stairtower only goes as low as deck 7 - its all crew area below deck 7 forward on those ships.

 

12 minutes ago, skynight said:

If my memory is still there believe the Coral and Island have center passenger staircases that go from decks 5 to 8. Their panoramic elevators also only travel between those decks.

I was going to correct the Deck 7 part from an earlier post.  I am 100% positive the center stairs are open for use on ISLAND.  I cannot recall 100% if above that as only been on once and memory unsure, but thought it wasn't a problem like REGAL/ROYAL had before they re-furbed the center stairwells and opened them up like they should have been all along.

 

[CruisinFinsUp]

On 2/12/2022 at 3:25 PM, cr8tiv1 said:

Only on the Grand Princess:  Stairs to nowhere (crew only).  Mid ship stairs only go from Deck 4 to Deck 7.  There are mid-ship elevators that go all the way up to Lido Deck.  If stairs are necessary, best to book aft or forward cabins.  

 

I believe they fixed this problem on the Majestic. 

 

Majestic and Grand are two totally different classes of ships.    You are perhaps thinking of the Royal.  

[cr8tiv1]

23 minutes ago, CruisinFinsUp said:

 

Majestic and Grand are two totally different classes of ships.    You are perhaps thinking of the Royal.  

 

You could very well be correct since I have not been on a Royal Class Ship, nor do I intend to sail on any.  I relied on memory for the Majestic (haha...shouldn't do that).  I thought they fixed her problem, but I believe moving forward, the rest of the Royal Class ships have central staircases.  

[newbie500]

On 2/12/2022 at 2:12 PM, macandlucy said:

Hi, hope someone can help answer this. We are new to Princess and have just booked cabin on Deck 11 on the Grand Princess. I chose it because it's, as it appears on the deck plan, close to the mid-ship staircase.

 

In reading some posts about the Grand this morning, I came across a couple that mentioned the lack of " a central staircase" or "no central staircase beyond deck 7".  

 

Could someone please clarify this for me? Is there a set of elevators and a staircase mid ship on deck 11? Or is it just for and aft? Or is it just deck 7 that lacks the mid ship stars? Or are "central staircase" and "midship staircase" different things?

 

It's important to us to be close to stairs, so I am now wondering if we have to change cabins. 

 

Thanks

 

 

I just got off the Grand yesterday. It does indeed have a central staircase, so you should be fine. The Royal was designed without a central public staircase. That proved to be a disaster for moving guests around the ship and the issue was corrected in dry dock. The "crew only" mid-ship stairs were opened up and carpeted for guest use. They aren't as wide as the fore and aft staircases, but they work. I believe this design flaw was corrected on other Royal class ships. Hope this helps.

 

[macandlucy]

5 hours ago, newbie500 said:

I just got off the Grand yesterday. It does indeed have a central staircase, so you should be fine. The Royal was designed without a central public staircase. That proved to be a disaster for moving guests around the ship and the issue was corrected in dry dock. The "crew only" mid-ship stairs were opened up and carpeted for guest use. They aren't as wide as the fore and aft staircases, but they work. I believe this design flaw was corrected on other Royal class ships. Hope this helps.

 

Thanks for this update! That is helpful and takes all of the mystery out of why a staircase midship is clearly visible on the deck plans. Dry dock!

Edited February 15, 2022 by macandlucy

[Coral]

8 hours ago, Cruise Raider said:

As others have noted, there are no midship stairs for passenger use on the Grand Princess ... but they do have midship elevators.  With fuller capacity, we've found that the area you have to walk by the photo gallery often bottle necks when you are walking along deck 7 to go midship from the aft stairs.  We never found it an issue when we used to forward stair well, though.  And, with the current reduced capacity, we also haven't found the bottle necks to be problematic.  

The other minor issue with the Grand is that the stateroom closets are smaller as are the in room safes.  

For the positives, the crew / staff is phenomenal.  Alfredos is a huge plus in my book, too.  It went through a nice refurbishment during the pandemic.  The bedside lamps all have usb ports in them .. nice little touch, IMO.  

 

I believe it is going into dry dock before Alaska this year also.