FINISHING TOUCHES BEING PUT ON $300 MILLION CRUISE PORT
NASSAU, Bahamas — The $300 million Nassau Cruise Port, which is almost completed after three and a half years of construction, will be a “game changer” for downtown Nassau and Bahamian tourism, CEO of Nassau Cruise Port Mike Maura Jr. said yesterday, noting that the transformational development is on track for an official opening on May 26, The Nassau Guardian reported on Tuesday, May 16, in an article written by Executive Editor Candia Dames.
“We’re doing our part to polish that Bahamas brand,” said Maura as he led members of The Nassau Guardian’s team on a tour of the new port yesterday.
“…This is an example of a successful PPP (public-private partnership) and looking right there is another successful example of a PPP at the container port, and The Bahamas, I think, has led the way in investing in maritime infrastructure and we will have visits for the next three years from others wondering how can they do what Nassau did.”
Maura said the new cruise port will be “quite phenomenal”.
For starters, it can accommodate three Icon class cruise ships — the largest ships in the world.
“The port today can handle six ships. It can handle three of the largest ships in the world. Historically, there would have been references to Oasis and that has been the ship class that’s been used over the last 10 years to promote the largest ship in the world, but it is no longer,” Maura said.
“The Icon class is that next step in terms of vessel growth, and so we can put two Icon class on the north berths, five and six, and we can put one on berth one. If we had a day where we didn’t actually have six ships, we can actually handle four Icon class vessels in one day and those ships have about 7,500 passengers and around 2,600 crew.”
That’s a whole lot of passengers.
An estimated four million cruise passengers, in fact, are expected to visit the Port of Nassau this year.
“We’ve already had a day of 28,554 passengers,” Maura noted.
“Historically, a 20,000 day would have been everyone ‘high-fiving’ one another, but, today, we will be exceeding 30,000 in a day given the investments we’ve made on the marine side.”
Dredge material from the construction of the sixth pier was used to expand the western side of the port’s commercial area.
The cruise port project started in October 2019, continued apace throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and progressed further after a change of government in September 2021.
“Back in 2019, it took profound leadership at the time, because as Bahamians, we are very nationalistic and the fact is that the real estate along our waterfront specific to Prince George Wharf was owned by the people, regulated by the government, controlled by the government, and to make a decision to pass that off to the private sector and in effect lend it to them and allow them to improve upon it [took leadership],” Maura said.
“And the Nassau Cruise Port Ltd. has been able to raise $300 million to be able to transport our waterfront landscape in our capital city, and then the government changed and it took the same degree of leadership and confidence [by] this administration to reach down and pick the shovel up that was dropped on that day when government changed, and continue this project and ensure that what you see before you will happen.”
See complete article in The Nassau Guardian at https://thenassauguardian.com/game-changer-for-tourism/
