Genoa Fills Its Schedule with Cruise Ships

Barcelona - Genoa has received good news from three major players in the cruise sector, one repeat customer, and two that are new to the port. The dense network of contacts and negotiations at Sea Trade Med in Barcelona has allowed Genoa to obtain the confirmation that P&O’s ships will return for the 2015 season.

The Carnival Group company will thus continue to moor its ships at the Maritime Station, and starting next year it will also be in good company. Besides the guaranteed traffic from MSC, Princess Cruises and Mein Schiff’s ships will also come to Genoa.

In particular, Princess will bring three units to Genoa’s port: the Caribbean, a 3,000-passenger cruise ship, the “Emerald”, and the Ocean. The “Emerald” and the “Ocean” both carry about 700 passengers, but the latter is smaller and more exclusive.

In total, 11 calls are planned for Genoa, which means 70,000 more tourists arriving in the city. But an agreement was also concluded with Mein Schiff yesterday afternoon. The German company which is part of the TUI Group will also make four calls at Genoa in 2015 with the “Mein Schiff 1”, which carries over 2,500 passengers.

So, in total, approximately 80,000 more passengers will be recorded on Genoa’s arrival rolls. The significance of the two Carnival Group companies’ (Princess and P&O) arrival in Genoa is to a certain degree political, since the cruise ship giant also owns the Costa Crociere brand.

“These are good results, and in particular because of the privatisation of the airport,” Genoa’s Port Authority President Luigi Merlo explained, “because they make the Cristoforo Colombo Airport more appealing to the market: P&O is very pleased with the possibility of having an airport at a short distance from the ships, and this is the added value that we provide.”

The Maritime Stations are also being outfitted with new equipment and infrastructure. Next year, the Spanish company Adelte will build a new finger pier for the Ponte dei Mille wharf to receive the latest generation of cruise ships.

The latest large ships have lifeboats that stick out farther than the older units did, which saves space and increases the number of cabins, and this means that the port infrastructure will have to adapt.

A new finger pier is planned for the Maritime Station side of the Hennebique silos, which will allow for easy passenger disembarkation. In economic terms, it is an important commission, since each finger pier will cost somewhere between half a million and three million euros.

La Spezia is now also working to upgrade its port infrastructure. Port Authority President Lorenzo Forcieri is convinced that the port has not lost traffic to Livorno, because the port of La Spezia, which currently receives 650,000 cruise ship passengers, is operating near maximum capacity.

In Barcelona, Forcieri met with many companies’ top management and did not avoid conversation with Pierfrancesco Vago, MSC’s Executive Chairman. La Spezia’s strategy is clear: to continue the expansion of the cruise ship business, the port needs another new terminal, and credible sources have confirmed for the MediTelegraph that besides the Aponte company, other companies that call at La Spezia are interested in being involved in the facility, Royal Caribbean in particular.

Savona, on the other hand, is less exposed to the winds of the market, and its port partnership - led by Gian Luigi Miazza and Costa Crociere - seems to be solid, as its traffic of over one million passengers confirms.

The figures for Liguria’s ports are very exciting. Predictions for next year have it that 2015 traffic for the three Ligurian ports could exceed Lazio’s traffic for the first time in recent history.

That means they would total more traffic than the port of Rome, Civitavecchia. For the moment Lazio and Liguria are head to head, which is already a record achievement. “If these figures prove correct,” Forcieri explained, “this would be an excellent answer to those who said one year ago that competition between Liguria’s ports would have devastating effects. On the contrary, we didn’t steal traffic from each other.” Beyond Liguria’s ports, even Palermo is returning from Barcelona with a positive result: The Emerald Princess will make seven calls at the Sicilian port in 2015.