From April to July the terminal has welcomed 15 turnaround calls from cruise vessels and 20 day visits, generated an estimated £4m for the city economy. Tony McDonough reports
Liverpool Cruise Terminal has welcomed 57,590 visitors in the current cruise season – a rise of 150% compared to the same point last year.
And with 12 weeks of the season still to run the terminal is expecting 2018 to be a record-breaking year.
From April to July the terminal, off Princes Dock, has seen 15 turnaround calls from cruise vessels and 20 day visits and this has generated an estimated £4m for the city centre economy.
Highlights so far include the visit of Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth visiting on the 80th anniversary of the second Mauritania leaving the Cammell Laird shipyard.
The season caps a successful 10 years for Liverpool’s Cruise Terminal, which is on course to have welcomed over 400 ships, 600,000 visitors and brought around £60m to the local economy by the end of 2018.
And there’s still so much more to come with the arrival of Berlin (on Saturday, August 11), Aida Aura, Seabourn Ovation and Ocean Dream who are all making their Mersey debut in coming days and weeks. And the city is set to welcome back Disney ‘Magic on the Mersey’ on Friday, September 7.
Cruise Liverpool is encouraging everybody to join them for this free family-friendly garden party on Princes Parade to celebrate Mickey’s 90th birthday.
Cllr Wendy Simon, Deputy Mayor of Liverpool and Cabinet member for Culture and Events, said: “Liverpool’s appeal to the cruise sector continues to grow and we’re now welcoming more vessels with a larger capacity, hence our record number of visitors this summer.
“What is really exciting is that the new Cruise Terminal will enable us to accommodate theses larger vessels more frequently which is going to provide a great boost to our visitor economy over the coming decade.”
Pete Murney, Liverpool’s head of cruise and marine operations, added: “It’s been a pleasure and an honour to welcome almost 60,000 passengers and crew to Liverpool so far this cruise season.
“We have many more visitors to welcome in the next few weeks and are looking forward to showing them everything Liverpool has to offer.”