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The vote is the latest step in the Dutch capital’s long-running campaign to reduce the impact of tourism. Cruise Hive was established back in 2008 and among the earliest blogs in the industry. Since the start, it's been our aim to provide the latest cruise news covering all the major cruise lines. We make sure cruisers are fully prepared for their cruise vacation with tips on ships and ports.Millions of travelers rely on Cruise Hive in the United States, Europe, Australia, and around the world.
Amsterdam city council votes to ban cruise ships; no plans for immediate closure
Holland America Line’s ms Rotterdam is scheduled to make nine visits, making a total of 15 visits for Holland America Line. Norwegian Cruise Line also has 15 calls scheduled this year, six of these will be from the cruise line’s flagship, Norwegian Prima. Mayor Femke Halsema has been spearheading a campaign to discourage visitors from taking what she has called a “vacation from morals”. The decision comes amid a wider crackdown on the tourist influx and sense of disruption they bring to Amsterdam, a city famed for its red-light district and coffee shops that sell marijuana. More than 3.8 million passengers have gone through the Cruise Port Amsterdam since 2000, its website says, and more than 2,100 ships have docked in that port. In order to cultivate the skills of “creative young people who want to organise something at night,” it has stated its intention to locate nightclub settings such as abandoned tunnels and garages.
Amsterdam bans cruise liners in an effort to reduce mass tourism - CNN
Amsterdam bans cruise liners in an effort to reduce mass tourism.
Posted: Sun, 30 Jul 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
The Dutch city is trying to limit tourism and pollution
In 2019 the city introduced a tourist tax on cruise ship passengers which, at the time, led to lines including MSC Cruises, P&O Cruises and Cunard replacing or canceling calls at Amsterdam. With 20 million tourists each year, some of whom are attracted by the city’s reputation as a party destination, Amsterdam has over time become a victim of its own popularity, reported BBC. Dick de Graaff, director of Cruise Port Amsterdam which operates the terminal in the city centre, told the news agency that the company had taken note of the vote and is awaiting the municipality’s next move. The council’s call is to relocate the terminal – and we await a follow-up from the alderman on investigations,” he wrote in an email response. Amsterdam is one of the biggest cruise ports in Europe, which annually welcomes 700,000 cruise passengers and hundreds of mega-ships.
Amsterdam to ban cruise ships in bid to cut tourism, pollution
Anouk Panman, a spokesperson for deputy mayor Hester van Buren, confirmed in an email Friday the city council had adopted the motion. “The municipality of Amsterdam is going to investigate how this proposal can be implemented,” she wrote. “The motivation of the proposal from the City Council was to reduce the number of tourists, but also for environmental reasons,” Amsterdam’s deputy mayor, Hester van Buren, said in a statement on Friday. The Cruise Lines International Association — the advocacy group for cruise lines — said in a statement that a ban is unlikely; instead, they are working with Amsterdam to move the port outside of the city center. Amsterdam, which added that it was seeking to keep hotel stays by tourists to under 20 million per year, saw its highest number of visitors before the pandemic in 2019, when there were 25.2 million hotel stays, according to the city’s data.
The main cruise terminal on the River IJ, which is adjacent to the city’s main train station, will close as a result of the ban. Besides the influx of tourists in the city, the environmental footprint of the large cruise ships docking in the town is a primary concern. In addition, Amsterdam has a reputation as one of Europe's most notorious cities, famed for its cannabis cafes and red light district, with around 22 million tourists flocking there every year. In recent years, city officials have sought to reinvent the image of the Dutch capital by reducing party tourism and upping their sustainability stakes.
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“This will take some time, so at the moment we cannot give any details on how or when the proposal will be implemented,” she wrote. "This has to be discussed with our partners within the North Sea Canal area. This will take some time, so at the moment we cannot give any details on how or when the proposal will be implemented." The campaign, targeting young British men, involved online advertisements warning people searching for getaways to Amsterdam of the “consequences of antisocial behaviour and excessive drug and alcohol abuse”. De Graaff said that the Amsterdam terminal expects 114 ships to stop there this year and 130 next year. The city has outlined its aim to find nightclub locations such as disused tunnels and garages to develop the talent of "creative young people who want to organise something at night".
Amsterdam (Netherlands) implements measures to reduce riverboat cruises and over-tourism
In a separate development, Amsterdam has announced plans to beef up night-time culture for young people. Cruise ships have become a symbol of the problem, with more than 100 mooring in the capital every year. ✋ Targeting young British men with the “Stay Away” campaign, warning those searching for getaways to Amsterdam of the “consequences of antisocial behaviour and excessive drug and alcohol abuse,” including fines, arrest, criminal records, hospitalisation, and health issues. The Cruise Lines International Association, a trade group representing the cruise industry, did not respond to a request for comment. "It's not a form of tourism we welcome or don't welcome - it's a form of behaviour. What we do not welcome is people who come here on a vacation from morals.
Amsterdam Votes to Ban Cruise Ships; Additional Steps Still Required
Amsterdam will bar cruise ships from docking in the city center as part of a broader effort to curb pollution and reduce the large numbers of tourists who visit the Dutch capital. The Dutch capital will stop cruise ships from docking in the city center as part of a campaign to curb pollution and reduce the flow of tourists. Amsterdam's council has banned cruise ships from the city centre as the Dutch capital tries to limit visitor numbers and curb pollution. The move, to ban ships from the city's central cruise terminal, comes after Amsterdam launched a "stay away" campaign to discourage British party-goers and banned the smoking of cannabis on the streets of its famous red light district.
Santorini—Santorini started limiting the number of cruise ship passengers allowed per day to 8,000 in 2019. Santorini also saw spikes in air pollution in 2018, according to The Independent, which the Hellenic Ornithological Society blamed on the cruise ship industry's use of heavy fuel oil. Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema complained last year that cruise ships brought nothing substantial to the city, BBC reported, only letting visitors hit the streets for a few hours of partying before they were called back on board. For its part, the cruise industry is offering potential solutions to help ease the environmental impacts of the ships, like upgrading the current Amsterdam port with shore power to cut the amount of pollution emitted while vessels are docked, according to CLIA’s statement. Such efforts would likely be actioned through multiple phases over the next few years.
Amsterdam wants to decrease the number of visitors—or, at the very least, attract those who won’t create headaches for residents. To that end, earlier this year, the city launched a “stay away” advertising campaign targeting poorly behaved tourists. The trade group said about 1 percent of Amsterdam’s visitors arrive by cruise ship every year and noted that cruise tourism contributes about 105 million euros to the city every year. Industry group CLIA has clarified that cruise ships are currently still being welcomed to the city, and upcoming cruises with scheduled stops in Amsterdam are still allowed to port there.
Amsterdam’s city council voted last week to ban cruise ships from docking at the city’s main terminal. Officials hope the decision will help curb the number of tourists roaming around the Dutch capital, as well as protect the environment from the vessels’ emissions, reports the New York Times’ Isabella Kwai. Amsterdam's city council on July 20 voted to ban cruise ships from the center of Amsterdam in order to limit tourism and ease pollution in the Dutch capital.
She said that they did not benefit the city's residents because they only visited for a "couple of hours", ate meals at "international brands" and had "little time" to visit museums. "The polluting cruise is not in line with Amsterdam's sustainable ambitions," she wrote on Twitter. The proposal was adopted by a large majority of the city's council, which is run by a coalition of the centrist Democrats 66 party (D66), the social democratic PvdA and the GroenLinks environmentalists. “Although sustainable marine fuels and technologies are not yet available at scale, cruise lines are addressing these challenges with significant investments and innovative approaches,” the statement said.
And residents of Key West voted to ban giant ships in late 2020 — though that vote was overturned the following year. Amsterdam voted to ban cruise ships in an effort to cut back on the inflow of tourists and reduce pollution from the giant vessels. The number of tourists arriving by cruise ship pales compared to those visiting the city through the Amsterdam Schiphol Airport on cheap, extremely polluting short-haul flights. However, the council believes banning cruise ships will send out a message that it is serious about limiting tourism. The Dutch capital’s council voted on Thursday to restrict the jumbo ships from docking in the city and aims to close its central cruise-ship terminal, according to a municipality spokesperson. The timeline and details of implementation will be decided after consultations with various stakeholders, the spokesperson said.
Barcelona—Barcelona's regional government last year said it will limit cruise liners arriving at what was once Europe’s busiest cruise terminal. The city has struggled with over tourism since travel resumed post-Covid, Bloomberg reported, and short-term visitors from cruise ships aren’t seen as overly helpful to the local economy. Pollution was also a concern for the Spanish port—Barcelona was the European city most polluted by cruise ship emissions in 2019, per Bloomberg, and in 2017 there were 32.8 tons of sulfur oxides emitted at the port. "[Cruise pollution] does not match the sustainable ambitions of our city," D66 politician Ilana Rooderkerk said in a statement. "In addition, cruise ships in the city center do not fit into Amsterdam's task to reduce the number of tourists. In other words, Amsterdam sails better without cruises."
Amsterdam has banned cruise ships from docking in the city centre in its latest attempt to cut tourism and pollution. AMSTERDAM - Amsterdam voted to ban cruise ships, in an effort to cut back on the inflow of tourists and reduce pollution from the giant vessels. Cruise Lines International Association, an industry trade group, says in a statement that 1 percent of visitors to Amsterdam arrive via cruise ships, which contribute some 105 million euros to the city each year. Additionally, the group says that the terminal and port have pledged to “undertake investments worth millions of euros in port infrastructure and shoreside electricity for the long-term.” Whether those changes would be enough to address city officials’ concerns is unclear. In 2021, Italy’s government said large cruise ships would no longer be allowed to sail directly into Venice. Dubrovnik, in Croatia, took steps several years ago to limit the number of cruise passengers visiting at once.
The council claims cruise ship vessels are not conducive to the city's efforts to limit tourism and boost sustainability, according to a statement from the Democrats 66 party. Amsterdam’s latest measure against out-of-control tourism and worsening pollution is closing down a cruise ship terminal in the city center. The Dutch city’s municipal council voted on Thursday (July 21) to restrict large ships from docking in the center with aims to eventually close the terminal, the BBC reported. Amsterdam’s city council has voted to ban cruise ships in its latest attempt to curb mass tourism and pollution. In a move intended to curb pollution and manage tourism, the Amsterdam City Council has voted to prohibit cruise ships from docking in the city center.
