Vancouver Simply Surpasses Mid-12 months Cruise Information
The Port of Vancouver, the most important port in Canada, is already breaking previous information and the yr isn’t even over.
On October 1, 2024, the port shared a mid-year replace on cruise tourism, reporting that 554,546 passengers handed via the Canada Place cruise terminal between March 1 and June 30, 2024.
This marks a constructive 13% enhance over the file of 490,119 cruise company that visited the port throughout the identical time interval in 2023.
Port officers additionally introduced that its second busiest day of all time occurred on Monday, April 29, when just below 20,000 passengers handed via the terminal in at some point.
“Cruise continues to thrive in Vancouver—and that is testomony to the exhausting work and dedication of everybody concerned within the native trade as a lot as it’s to the area’s pure magnificence,” mentioned Peter Xotta, President and CEO of the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority.
It’s value noting that a lot of this progress can doubtless be attributed to this yr’s Alaska cruise season – which often runs from late April to early October, and is very busy throughout the peak summer season months.
Alaska sailings had been in notably excessive demand for 2024. As one of many high homeports and ports of name for these voyages, Vancouver was gearing up for a file breaking summer season nicely prematurely – and celebrated the constructive affect on the native financial system.
“Being a homeport vacation spot the place cruise traces base their ships for the Alaska season means advantages are unfold all through the area, from native meals and beverage suppliers to ship gasoline and restore suppliers to downtown eating places and motels,” added Xotta.
The cruise terminal could have welcomed a complete of 329 cruise ships between March 11 and October 29, 2024, when the Alaska season formally concludes.
Coming from throughout all of the ships, an estimated 1.27 million cruisers had been anticipated to step onto Canadian soil earlier than the tip of October, which is a 2% enhance from 2023’s file numbers.
Whereas it’s nonetheless too early to unveil the ultimate numbers for the complete length of the Alaska season, the mid-year replace leaves little doubt that the port won’t solely surpass its earlier information for the Alaska season, however for the yr as an entire.
Vancouver Improves Cruise Terminal Effectivity
As the largest port in Canada, the British Columbia port has made some adjustments to enhance the expertise within the Canada Place Cruise Terminal.
Most notably, the port partnered with U.S. Customs and Border Safety (CBP) in June 2024 to implement facial biometric know-how to assist expedite the embarkation course of.
Whereas comparable automated methods have begun to roll out in airports world wide, it’s the first time that biometric know-how has been used in Canada’s cruise tourism.
Utilizing facial recognition and synthetic intelligence, passengers’ identities may be checked and verified in a matter of the seconds – which is far sooner than the time it takes port workers to manually confirm particular person journey paperwork by hand.
The system merely takes a photograph of every passenger throughout the boarding course of, which is then matched in opposition to the photograph from their journey paperwork – permitting them to get to the enjoyable rather more conveniently and rapidly. Equally, after a cruise, debarkation may be a lot sooner and smoother.
Learn Additionally: Cruises From Vancouver: The Professionals and Cons
Contemplating the port can accommodate as much as 4 cruise ships at a time throughout three berths, 1000’s of passengers may very well be passing via Canada Place on any given day – making it additional essential to expedite and enhance the check-in and debarkation processes.
Plus, it’s solely getting busier! Along with experiencing the second busiest day in its historical past on April 29, the port additionally sailed via a further 5 of its high ten busiest days between April and June.
Apart from being a high Alaska port, Vancouver can also be a preferred gateway to different thrilling locations, which means it might probably keep busy all yr.
Many cruise traces, together with however not restricted to Princess Cruises, Holland America Line, and Celeb Cruises, provide Vancouver-based sailings to locations like Hawaii, Tahiti and the South Pacific, the US’ West Coast, the Panama Canal, the Mexican Riviera, and extra.