Will Carnival ever come back to Baltimore

[zebra36]

I don't know where you get your information from, but it's utter nonsense. There's a brand new, passenger-only facility at South Locust Point. I don't know what you consider "major bucks", but close to $14 million dollars was spent on a brand new facility, not "sprucing up" an old "commercial facility".

 

You can easily verify this at the port of baltimore's web site, rather than making stuff up.

 

 

Sorry we disagree but the Locust Point facility is a commercial cargo facility that was chosen over the Dundalk Marine Terminal because of less commercial traffic. The Maryland Port Authority site refers to the passenger facility there as "shed" which may be just their terminology but was used for facility at DMT as well. My sprucing up comment was directed at the general location.

[cruiser4life79]

Just either come to Flordia or go to NY, ur on vacation, enjoy it all, the plane ride... CCL I dont think will be giving up any ships from flordia execpt one and it's going to New Orleans. If it was up too me I wouldnt have any ships anywhere but flordia and Tx.... but that's me...

[BigDoug]

I don't know where you get your information from, but it's utter nonsense. There's a brand new, passenger-only facility at South Locust Point. I don't know what you consider "major bucks", but close to $14 million dollars was spent on a brand new facility, not "sprucing up" an old "commercial facility".

 

You can easily verify this at the port of baltimore's web site, rather than making stuff up.

A new terminal was not built. An existing cargo building was renovated for use as a cruise terminal.

Article in the Baltimore Business Journal about the proposed $4 million renovation: http://www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/stories/2005/09/19/story4.html

 

Announcement from the Maryland DOT about the new terminal (notice how the price jumped from $4 million to $13 million):http://http://www.mdot.state.md.us/News/2006/May%202006/New%20Cruise%20Terminal

 

Article about Baltimore cruises in the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2004/10/03/AR2005033106750.html

[ocean angel]

As happens all the time, the media reports information before they have ALL the information.

 

fnb218 and parrotrob - "shed" is the terminology used for all building on the Port of Baltimore terminals. The cruise passenger building was a building that had been used in the past for commercial cargo, however, it has been revamped into the current dedicated cruise terminal at a price tag of approx. $13 million. I guess they call it "new" because it's new for cruise traffic, but I assure you the building was formerly used for cargo. I can tell you from experience that it's nicer than the facility in Bayonne.

 

When the cruises went out of Dundalk, passengers had to drive onto the cargo terminal and to a parking area where they were shuttled by busses to the cruise facility - then a new shed was built for the cruises and parking changed, but the passengers still had to drive on a working marine terminal among cargo boxes, tractors, trucks, etc. Cruise passengers and cargo just don't mix very well.

 

At South Locust Point, although it was formerly a cargo shed - the renovations have resulted in a dedicated area just for cruise passengers. They do not need to drive through any cargo areas to reach the parking lot which is literally steps from the terminal.

 

I can tell you that Carnival is one of the lines that the POB is currently in discussions with - we hope to know something in the next couple of months as the lines choose their berthing slots for 2008 (just got that from our Marketing Director). Either way, there won't be any other lines until 2008, RCCL is sailing in 2007.