Chaos on the New York piers!

[Joanandjoe]

We’ve ended three cruises at the New York Passenger Ship terminal in Manhattan. The idea was that we would be 10 miles from home, so we’d have an easy end to our cruise. It has not worked that way. Disembarkation on three different lines, ranging from basic (Regal) to mainstream (HAL) to upscale (Radisson Seven Seas) has resulted in three bad experiences: slow clearance by the feds., no porters to be found, too many people, little help from the cruise lines, difficulty connecting with transportation. We’ve tried taxis and couldn’t get one for over an hour, and tried limos twice, and had to wait over a half hour for the limos to make it from the street to the pickup area. Utter chaos.

 

Our last experience, last month on Radisson, was the worst. There were six ships in town, one of which (Oreana) got diverted to Brooklyn, which wasn’t even open officially. (It opens next March, but will only handle one ship.) The port could not handle the more than 10,000 PAX, and our ship wasn’t cleared for disembarking until 2 hours and 20 minutes after we reached the dock. It took another hour for us to wait for our color, get our luggage, shlep four suitcases without a porter, and meet our limo; so we landed at 8:30 a.m. and got home (after a less than 15 minute trip) after noon. Had we gotten off the ship (without luggage) when we landed, we could have walked home and been there by 11 a.m.

 

Before anyone asks, we’ve had one occasion when we were the only ship in port. Things were better than last month, but still not very good.

 

If anyone has suggestions for improvement, we’ll try to assemble them and send them to the passenger relations departments at some of the lines that dock in NYC, such as Radisson, NCL, Princess, HAL, and Carnival. We’re posting this inquiry on all of those boards, and the board moderators should feel free to post it elsewhere on CC. Maybe we can use CC to improve this awful situation. WE LOVE NEW YORK, and want to have it a pleasant experience cruising from the City. Nothing beats sailing past the Statue of Liberty and the NYC skyline; but disembarkation ruins the good impression.

[BlueHerons]

JoanandJoe, nothing works better than threatening to take your cruise dollars to another port.

 

I think you can suggest all you want but because most of these workers are Union, until many people threaten to boycott you'll will not see any improvement.

 

Good luck!

[spongerob]

Carnival (corporation) lines will soon be using Red Hook. That old terminal just doesn't cut it. Once was enough for us, and we were just embarking. I'd hate to go through disembarkation there. It was bad enough having to get on a nice ship in a terminal that had bird droppings all over the inside.

[MrPete]

We have it down to a science, and are home in 30 minutes.

 

We do the self assist, run our luggage to the curb, I run upstairs to retrieve my car, come down to get luggage and family, and am on 9A all in ten minutes.

 

We've had three to five ships there. Maybe we were just lucky.

[MrPete]

Dupe

[tinna2000]

We have it down to a science, and are home in 30 minutes.

 

We do the self assist, run our luggage to the curb, I run upstairs to retrieve my car, come down to get luggage and family, and am on 9A all in ten minutes.

 

We've had three to five ships there. Maybe we were just lucky.

[Joanandjoe]

Lucky you, Tinna, if you were able to get a cab. When we arrived on the Regal Empress, we were the only ship in port, and still couldn't find a porter or a cab. Maybe we've just been unlucky.

 

Yes, Carnival will use Red Hook for several of its lines; but we understand that it has only one berth. That won't help much. On 9/24 the Oreana docked in Brooklyn and the Zenith in Bayonne; but that still left the Norwegian Crown, Carnival Triumph, 7 Seas Navigator, Golden Princess, and Sea Princess in Manhattan. Seven ships in the harbor in one day is about 3 too many. Since our cruise was one way from Montreal, there was no way we could have parked on the dock. For our next, 11 night cruise in the winter, dock parking would be too expensivre and there would be too much of a risk of having to clean off snow when we arrive.

 

In New Yawk we don't badmouth unions; but it's true that if the lack of porters is due to union rules, there's no solution.