First cruise ship of 2009 season docks in Vancouver Friday

The Balmoral, a cruise ship operated by Fred. Olsen Cruise Lines of Norway, will roll into Vancouver's Canada Place Friday to mark the first docking of the 2009 Vancouver cruise ship season.

Despite recent announcements that several lines will give Vancouver a miss from 2010 due to the slumping economy and high prices flying in and out of Vancouver's YVR airport, Port Metro Vancouver claims this will be a busy season on the docks.

According to a statement, 35 vessels will come to town a total of 253 times this year, moving approximately 875,000 passengers through the Canada Place and Ballantyne cruise terminals.

855,000 people came to Vancouver for cruises in 2008, according to Port Metro Vancouver statistics.

Holland America, owner of the Volendam and its sister ships, announced in March that it would be replacing 20 seven-day sailings between Vancouver and Seward, Alaska, with ten 14-day sailings between Seattle and Anchorage.

In addition, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines will move its Serenade of the Seas to the Caribbean, cancelling that ship's Alaska cruises for 2010, a loss of 19 sailings for Vancouver, and Norwegian Cruise Lines will change its 10 round-trip sailings by the Norwegian Sun into one-way voyages, essentially cutting the sailings in half.

Despite this, Port Metro Vancouver remains buoyant for the coming year.

The outlook for this year is quite positive, and in consideration of current economic conditions that affect the cruise business, we will be working with our industry partners to enhance our competitive position going forward, said PMV President and Chief Executive Officer Robin Silvester in a release.

Improvements to the Canada Place terminal include a new service called shore power, which allows cruise ship crews to shut their engines down while docked, utilizing shore-based electrical power. This is said to vastly reduce fuel usage and reduce marine diesel and greenhouse gas emissions.

Source: Vancouver Sun