Shamrocked By Dublin

A few weeks ago a posted a blog in relation to the City of Amsterdam imposing a tax on cruise ship passengers docking in the city forcing a number of the cruise lines to take action and start to dock further outside and coach their passengers in and out the city.  It seems this weekend that another city has turned against us cruise passengers and doesn’t want us stopping there.

The Dublin Port Authority has announced that from 2021 they will be halving the number of cruise ships they will allow to dock in the city.  Currently for 2019 there are 160 cruise ships due to stop at the city and for 2021 there are 140 booked to stop.  From 2021 this will be limited to just 80 cruise ships per year, with no ships allowed to home port here.  This will mean the likes of Celebrity Reflection who has been based out of Dublin for her a number of her summer seasons will have to sail off into the horizon and find a new summer home.

The port authority has limited the visits to:

• Two large cruise ships in the summer season
• One per week in the winter
• Zero turnarounds (a stop where passengers first join or finally leave the ship)

The response from the port authority is that these measures have been taken to limit the number of ships and passengers coming into the port when they don’t have the necessary infrastructure and berths to accommodate them.  In order for this to be possibly reviewed in the future there would need to be extra berths constructed and then this would require part financing or long term financial guarantees from cruise lines.

I think this is drastic measures that the port and the city could possibly regret.  Dublin is a beautiful city and a lot of people want to see it and it can be the emerald jewel in many an itinerary (did you see what I did there?).  Us cruise passengers bring a lot of revenue into any city that welcomes us and limiting this could have an effect on their economy.  But then again I am not an economist.

What are your thoughts on this? Let me know in the comments.