Port Overcrowding and Corporate Responsibility

[v3cruiser]

It seems like a logistical problem that needs work. The port and or ncl needs to space out the landings on the pier to effectively get people where they need to go instead of debarking all ships at about the same time. Perhaps improve infrastructure to better accomodate the 10k people allowed per day. 

[mjkacmom]

9 minutes ago, v3cruiser said:

It seems like a logistical problem that needs work. The port and or ncl needs to space out the landings on the pier to effectively get people where they need to go instead of debarking all ships at about the same time. Perhaps improve infrastructure to better accomodate the 10k people allowed per day. 

I guess that’s on Greece.

[SeaShark]

9 hours ago, Mr. Grizb said:

Remind me what NCLH stands for again? As for the drama, apparently you’d have had to be there…

 

NCLH stands for "Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings" which is a publicly traded financial holding company. Norwegian Cruise Line (which is the topic of this forum) is a cruise line operator that is owned by NCLH. Norwegian Cruise Line does NOT have any subsidiary companies.

 

I don't have to be there. I recognize drama when I see it. The port established visitor limits. Only when those limits are exceeded can there be "overcrowding". You've shown nothing to indicate that the visitor limit was exceeded. Instead you try to use dramatic language (hence, the drama) such as "massively overblown" to make it appear that the numbers were far greater than they actually were. Reading this thread, it would seem that the REAL issue here is that you found yourself in a situation where you had to wait in line or wait your turn and you simply unhappy with the fact that you should have to wait.

[BirdTravels]

19 hours ago, Mr. Grizb said:

I may have been unclear in my original post, it is not possible for Norwegian to ensure that there is only one large ship at Santorini on a given day. I am suggesting that they should ensure that there is only one large ship owned by them in the port on a single day.

 

NCL or NCLH has absolutely no "corporate responsibility" to manage the port. If they were not there, another cruise line would take their place. The port controls the number of ships and the number of passengers it allows each day. 

 

The ships that were in port were not "large" ships. Maybe by standards 30 years ago, but not by today's standards. 

 

NCL may, based on customer feedback like yours, make a decision not to call at the port at all because you or passengers from your cruise had to wait in line. So, you may see the port disappear altogether because of your complaints. Or as the cruise date approaches, after final payment, when they determine that the port will be crowded, cancel the port and turn it into a sea day, based on customer feedback. 

[zqvol]

14 hours ago, BirdTravels said:

Isn't that why NCL built the Prima class ships like the Viva with 3000 passengers? Provide access to smaller ports?

Nothing small about Prima. A small ship carries less than 750 people. A mid size ship less than 2000. Anything larger is a large ship. Ports are getting smarter and limiting access to small and mid size ships.  

Edited June 1 by zqvol

[Seminole1975]

16 hours ago, Wayward Son said:

 

I'm the exact opposite. I will not deliberately take a cruise that stops in Santorini. If I must for other reasons, that will be a ship day for me. There is much more to see in Greece than one overcrowded, unmanageable port.

 

I have seen it one time but I will not go back. I will not go back because of the donkey abuse. I have heard there are movements to stop the donkey rides up to the stop. Their conditions were horrendous. 

[9tee2Sea]

1. if folks are concerned about Port Overcrowding, don't go on a cruise that goes to those places
2. ( or don't go on a cruise any longer at all).  It now seems that if I want to see Venice again ( for the third time), I will have to fly , and then stay in a hotel ( really...how sad is that...joking).  Same with Barcelona.  Now, once everyone figures out that Cruise ship passengers are not totally to blame for overcrowding, maybe they will start banning airlines ( the way things are going, one never knows).  Went to Santorini once, 1976.  Friends that have recently gone say the will never go back.  

[SeaShark]

31 minutes ago, zqvol said:

Nothing small about Prima. A small ship carries less than 750 people. A mid size ship less than 2000. Anything larger is a large ship. Ports are getting smarter and limiting access to small and mid size ships.  

 

Might want to read it again. Nobody said Prima was small. The reference was to ships that could access "smaller ports", not to small ships.

[ontheweb]

5 hours ago, njkate said:

Bora Bora as well from what I’ve read

Thanks, another place we have never been to, and probably never will.

 

(Though it would be nice to get to Venice someday, but preferably as part of a land trip.)

[wolfie11]

6 hours ago, JamesIowa said:

The responsibility rests solely with the destination, its people, policies and law. 

That’s the most naive thing I’ve read in quite a while.  What do you think happens when a port town decides they want to limit ships?  When local citizens put together a petition to try and get ship limits on the ballot?  The cruise lines rush in, form political PAC’s, funnel millions into ads about how wonderful the cruise ships are and how much they love the locals.  They support politicians who support the cruise lines.  And if in spite of their efforts, a limit to the ship numbers actually passes, they bring in an army of lawyers and start filing lawsuits. If they can get away with it, they offer bribes to local officials to keep the cruise ships coming.  It took Venice 10 years to stop the cruise ships.  

[wolfie11]

Duplicate

Edited June 1 by wolfie11

[ontheweb]

54 minutes ago, wolfie11 said:

Duplicate

It was probably worth saying again. And you can add Key West as a port where the locals wanted one thing and then politics at the state level took over.

[ontheweb]

Can we all agree on one thing. No matter whose fault it is it is not a pleasant experience for any cruiser to get off at a port with 10,000 others, especially if it is a tender port like Corfu.

[JamesIowa]

1 hour ago, wolfie11 said:

That’s the most naive thing I’ve read in quite a while.  What do you think happens when a port town decides they want to limit ships?  When local citizens put together a petition to try and get ship limits on the ballot?  The cruise lines rush in, form political PAC’s, funnel millions into ads about how wonderful the cruise ships are and how much they love the locals.  They support politicians who support the cruise lines.  And if in spite of their efforts, a limit to the ship numbers actually passes, they bring in an army of lawyers and start filing lawsuits. If they can get away with it, they offer bribes to local officials to keep the cruise ships coming.  It took Venice 10 years to stop the cruise ships.  

Now that is naive. Friend, that’s how the world works. NCL does not make these policies. Of course they try to influence them in their interest, do you live under a rock?

[wolfie11]

2 minutes ago, JamesIowa said:

Now that is naive. Friend, that’s how the world works. NCL does not make these policies. Of course they try to influence them in their interest, do you live under a rock?

So you agree that NCL is a bully with only its bottom line as a standard of behavior.  While you firmly asserted a few posts above that it is totally the responsibility of the port to control its numbers through its people, policies, and laws, you have no problem with NCL roaring into town and spending millions of dollars to buy or influence people, subvert their laws, and overtax their infrastructure. 

[RocketMan275]

1 hour ago, wolfie11 said:

So you agree that NCL is a bully with only its bottom line as a standard of behavior.  While you firmly asserted a few posts above that it is totally the responsibility of the port to control its numbers through its people, policies, and laws, you have no problem with NCL roaring into town and spending millions of dollars to buy or influence people, subvert their laws, and overtax their infrastructure. 

Did it ever occur to you that the people living in that port, many making their living from the cruise passengers, might actually prefer large numbers?  Did it ever occur to  you that those advocating for fewer visitors might be  a minority?

[wolfie11]

1 hour ago, RocketMan275 said:

Did it ever occur to you that the people living in that port, many making their living from the cruise passengers, might actually prefer large numbers?  Did it ever occur to  you that those advocating for fewer visitors might be  a minority?

If they were a minority, the vote to limit cruise ships would never pass.  I would ask you to name me three ports where the majority of the inhabitants make their living off of cruise ship passengers.  Even in the Caribbean, the emphasis is on private islands, cruise ship shore excursions and shopping in cruise ship-owned stores.  Very few Alaskans depend on the cruise ships as a main source of income, nor do Europeans in the big cruise ports.  Many local business owners in Bar Harbor lose money when the town is flooded with cruisers. More is not better as far as many local residents are concerned.

[dlh015]

https://www.outsideonline.com/adventure-travel/news-analysis/key-west-cruise-ships/

 

"Liking what they saw, some Key West residents attempted to make the reprieve permanent. In November 2020, they voted on and decisively passed three landmark measures limiting cruise-ship traffic to just the smallest ships and those with the cleanest environmental records. (Two of the measures were approved by over 60 percent of voters and the other by more than 80 percent.) "

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, RocketMan275 said:

Did it ever occur to you that the people living in that port, many making their living from the cruise passengers, might actually prefer large numbers?  Did it ever occur to  you that those advocating for fewer visitors might be  a minority?

See post #43 later in the thread. That seems to say the opposite of what you have stated.

[BirdTravels]

1 hour ago, wolfie11 said:

If they were a minority, the vote to limit cruise ships would never pass.  I would ask you to name me three ports where the majority of the inhabitants make their living off of cruise ship passengers.  Even in the Caribbean, the emphasis is on private islands, cruise ship shore excursions and shopping in cruise ship-owned stores.  Very few Alaskans depend on the cruise ships as a main source of income, nor do Europeans in the big cruise ports.  Many local business owners in Bar Harbor lose money when the town is flooded with cruisers. More is not better as far as many local residents are concerned.

I think that you are pretty much batting zero with this post. Pretty naive if you think any of it is true. 

[julig22]

With cruise tourism booming, Juneau has negotiated a limit on how many passengers can come off ships (ktoo.org)

[Menocchio]

I think we're seeing a global backlash to tourism in general right now, following the huge surge in travel after the pandemic. I'm seeing anti-tourism measures everywhere from Czechia to Japan. This is exacerbated by the housing crisis happening in many places across North America and Europe, since tourists are easy to blame for pricing the locals out of housing.

 

Cruises aren't as direct a contributor to that problem (if you're sleeping on a ship, you aren't in an AirBnB that could have been someone's home), but they have another problem- their numbers are limited only by the ships, not the city's infrastructure. The number of land tourists in a region can't really surpass the number of beds, and you can only build hotels so fast. But you can always send more ships. And bigger ships. Easily outpacing any ability to build up the infrastructure to better handle the numbers. If you even want to spend on building up tourist infrastructure, as opposed to stuff the locals use. 

[RocketMan275]

10 hours ago, ontheweb said:

See post #43 later in the thread. That seems to say the opposite of what you have stated.

Why would one think that Key West is representative of Santorini?

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, RocketMan275 said:

Why would one think that Key West is representative of Santorini?

You are reading more into what I wrote than was there. All I said, as opposed to your hypothetical that residents would not vote to disallow large cruise ships or a large number of passengers disembarking was that when there was a vote it came out overwhelmingly in favor of limiting large cruise ships and large numbers of passengers disembarking.

[raitch]

Santorini would be a tricky port even with only 3,000 passengers. You tender to a pier and then need to walk up 600 steps, or ride a mule up those same steps, or take a cable car.

 The cable car can move a maximum of 1,200 people per hour (600 per direction). There are VERY few other ways to get from the pier to… anywhere.

 

It’s a bottleneck even on good days. And going down is worse/longer lines than going up.

 

My understanding is that there are no NCL excursions that allow you to depart from the pier (or at least my sailing in August doesn’t have any). I know other lines have other set-ups.

 

Looking at the port schedule there are days with 7 ships in port. 7!