Passenger numbers will be up 115% in Tyne next year
Submitted by CE-Press on 12 December 2011 - 9:56am
Tyne is expecting 38,000 passengers next year, up 115% on the 17,658 this year.
Calls number 20 in 2011, of which 11 were turnarounds. In 2012 there will be 19 transit and 18 turnaround calls. It is only five years since the port had its first turnaround call.
The World visited for the first time this June. Fred Olsen Cruise Lines and Cruise & Maritime Voyages both do turnarounds.
Nearby Newcastle United’s St James Park is hosting the Olympic football next year which could have a positive knock-on effect on Tyne.
Over the past 20 years, cruiseships calling Lerwick - a founder member of Cruise Europe - have changed name and changed company, sometimes three times.
For example in 1996 and 1999 Cunard Line’s Royal Viking Sun called. In 2000 the same ship called as Seabourn Sun and since then she has called as Prinsendam in 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2011.
“European port facilities are amongst the best in the world,” Nigel Lingard, marketing director Fred Olsen Cruise Lines (pictured), told the Cruise Europe conference participants in May.
Among his remarks on what makes Europe ‘hot’, he pointed out that there are 500 UNESCO world heritage sites in Europe, that “the infrastructure works” and that “there are plenty of places for us to explore even on our own doorstep”.
Cruise Europe held its 20th conference in Stavanger on May 11 with about 50 of its member ports attending as well as cruise executives from Holland America Line (HAL), AIDA Cruises, Fred Olsen Cruise Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd, MSC Cruises and SeaDream Yacht Club and selected trade press.
