Cruise Ship Trifector Highlights Need For Dedicated Auckland Terminal

Thursday 12 February 2008

ARC Chairman Mike Lee says the presence of three cruise ships in Auckland today illustrates the urgent need for a new dedicated cruise ship facility in the city.

“The Tahitian Princess, Nippon Maru and Queen Victoria are all in port and passenger handling capacity is stretched to its limit,” said Mr Lee.

The Nippon Maru is visiting the city for four days and both the Queen Victoria and Tahitian Princess arrived early this morning.

“The current facility at Princes Wharf, despite a well organised multiple agency effort to process disembarking and embarking passengers, is clearly inadequate and temporary facilities at Queens Wharf are substandard.

The Queen Victoria is carrying around 2000 passengers, 650 are on board the Tahitian Princess and the Nippon Maru caters for 285 students from 18 countries enrolled in a world youth education programme.

Cruise New Zealand Chairperson Craig Harris said traffic restrictions experienced in the area are another bug bear.

“A purpose-built terminal would definitely minimise the chaos caused when 80 coaches and 200 taxis converge in the one place to collect international visitors,” he said.

“We have 74 cruise ships booked to visit Auckland this season and this is the second time three ship visits have coincided. We’ve already seen two ships visiting on 17 different occasions and the frequency of visits is expected to increase.”

Late last year the Auckland Regional Council resolved to push ahead with scoping a cruise ship terminal. Active planning is underway with talks taking place between ARC, cruise ship operators and the government.

“More than 111,000 passengers on 99 cruise ships visited New Zealand during the 2007/08 cruise ship season – 73 of which called in to Auckland,” he said. “Plus we estimate around 64% of the national GDP impact generated by the cruise ship industry can be directly linked to Auckland’s status as a transfer port – that equates to around $117 million.

“A report prepared by Covec for the government last year tells us that if Auckland committed to a new cruise ship terminal on Queens Wharf then key cruise operators would be likely to deploy more ships to the region, potentially generating another $713 million over the next ten years.

“Cruise ship visits are becoming a very important part of our tourism industry and tourism creates similar value for Auckland as an export industry.

“A new cruise ship terminal is something we need to get on with,” said Mr Lee.

ENDS

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