Possibly larger cruise ports for Los Angeles?!

[VillainsGin]

I'm a bit behind on the news for Los Angeles since I'm already accustomed to flying out towards MIA if i want to sail the larger ships on royal. (symphony/icon/odyssey/etc.)

It looks like they're resuming a decade old plan of expanded the ports to accommodate larger cruise ships, if I'm reading it correctly. There's a lot of fluff in between the articles but keywords I was mainly focused on was expanding ports for larger ships.

This would be absolutely HUGE news for all the residents of California (myself included) and states neighboring us! I always dread flying to MIA to sail the much larger ships so if these news articles are true does that mean we'll have oasis/quantum/icon class ships eventually calling Los Angeles port!?!?

I'm extremely giddy finding out about this, although the news was dated earlier of this year.

I've been complaining for about a decade now wishing there was a larger cruise port to accommodate larger royal ships. It helps tremendously with time & money.

•Pros to having larger cruise ports •

1. Saves time from coordinating flights to MIA and back.
2. Saves money from all the related cost/fees/taxes that comes with flying/hotels. ( I always book a hotel the night before to give myself enough time before embarkation)
3. Caters to the west coast guest and helps generate more traffic for the state.

 

~~~Can anyone confirm if they're actually in the works of building larger ports for larger cruise ships?~~~

 

New sources below:

https://maritime-executive.com/article/los-angeles-seeks-input-to-double-cruise-terminals-with-outer-harbor

https://www.cruisehive.com/los-angeles-new-cruise-terminal-plan-underway-again/94634

https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/la-west/travel/2023/02/16/port-of-la-expands-cruise-services

[WAYNO]

As a West Coaster, I've learned to appreciate the convenience and economy of cruising from the West Coast.  Coming up soon will be our 4th and 5th cruises from LA within one year, every one of them to the same three Mexican ports.  I've also learned, LA doesn't have the interest or take as seriously, the cruise industry. 

Not as an argument, but to entertain discussion, where would more or bigger ships cruise to?  We don't have the many and easy 7-day destinations that Florida cruises have to choose from. 

I know, the West Coasts of Central and South America must have vacation destinations, but we, or I, just don't hear of them, as we do those of the Caribbean ports. 

 

[VillainsGin]

30 minutes ago, WAYNO said:

As a West Coaster, I've learned to appreciate the convenience and economy of cruising from the West Coast.  Coming up soon will be our 4th and 5th cruises from LA within one year, every one of them to the same three Mexican ports.  I've also learned, LA doesn't have the interest or take as seriously, the cruise industry. 

Not as an argument, but to entertain discussion, where would more or bigger ships cruise to?  We don't have the many and easy 7-day destinations that Florida cruises have to choose from. 

I know, the West Coasts of Central and South America must have vacation destinations, but we, or I, just don't hear of them, as we do those of the Caribbean ports. 

 

I was afraid of the looming facts that supports Los Angeles from being interested at all for expanding the ports. You bring up a good point of the itinerary and ports of visit being limited, even for 7 night sailing I can only imagine us either going up north more or down south more along the coast.

I think we represent the minority with the opportunity to sail the same itinerary more than once.

This could also be a great option to leverage reduced revenue from logistics/container shipping when it under performs by filling it in with cruising.

Regardless of the limited ports of call Los Angeles accommodating for larger ports definitely will bring in more traffic from neighboring states as well.

I personally prioritize the amenities and features of a cruise ship over the ports of call, the bigger the ship the more entertainment. Helps when they dock in the various ports of Mexico the new guest gets off the explore and I can take advantage of the empty hot tubs/pools

Click bait articles got me all riled up and was hoping for some truth in there.

[WAYNO]

11 minutes ago, VillainsGin said:

I was afraid of the looming facts that supports Los Angeles from being interested at all for expanding the ports. You bring up a good point of the itinerary and ports of visit being limited, even for 7 night sailing I can only imagine us either going up north more or down south more along the coast.

I think we represent the minority with the opportunity to sail the same itinerary more than once.

This could also be a great option to leverage reduced revenue from logistics/container shipping when it under performs by filling it in with cruising.

Regardless of the limited ports of call Los Angeles accommodating for larger ports definitely will bring in more traffic from neighboring states as well.

I personally prioritize the amenities and features of a cruise ship over the ports of call, the bigger the ship the more entertainment. Helps when they dock in the various ports of Mexico the new guest gets off the explore and I can take advantage of the empty hot tubs/pools

Click bait articles got me all riled up and was hoping for some truth in there.

A couple points...

I also could be happy cruising with no port stops.  The ship is central to me also, as the centerpiece of the cruise.  But we know the ship has to make an international stop, somewhere.  Other than that required stop, I'd be happy spinning cookies out in the sunny ocean.

I've cruised from Seattle, via Royal, twice.  Once North, and once South.  Seattle is also not a cruise-friendly town.  But as with LA, the ship has to depart from somewhere. The Southern cruise, with Astoria and San Francisco as ports of call, remains one of my favorite cruises.  A similar Northern cruise could be launched from LA. , but folks would have to understand, this may not be a sunny cruise, even in the summer.  So that could limit the customer base, and further, would likely be seasonal.

Bottom line... Yes, I would support an expansion of cruise ports in California,  Even from San Francisco.  If we had the port facilities for larger ships, I'll bet the ports of call would quickly be arranged.  Western South and Central America could also use tourist dollars. 

[twangster]

Seasoned cruisers may assign the "ship is the destination" a higher priority but on a typical cruise just over half of all guests on board are new to cruise or new to Royal.  For these newer cruisers they always look at ports with a higher priority over the ship. 

Nearly all cruisers when they are new want more ports stops, not fewer port stops.  Only once people have cruised a fair bit will they value more sea days over more port days.  Unfortunately these frequent cruisers are not the majority on the ship rather a small minority and that is not who the cruise lines target.   It's hard to fill ships consistently with frequent cruisers and there is less revenue from seasoned cruisers on a per guest basis.  

The bigger problem for larger ships is the need to tender on many west coast itineraries.  That will also limit ship size unless you remove tender ports but that means reducing the number of ports of call and that gets us back to the issue with new cruisers wanting more ports stops not fewer.  

Larger berths make sense if you are going to make any infrastructure investments for any port but that doesn't mean larger ships will be homeported there.   This is a case of "If you build it, they may not come".

However they can probably accommodate more not-large ships at the same time so if you are a loyal brand cruisers there is greater chance that your brand may operate from LA.  MSC loyalist?  Maybe a ship like Divina could homeport.  Celebrity and Royal and Princess on the same day.  Another Carnival ship in addition to Long Beach.  These are  likely the biggest benefits to west coast cruisers from the expansion announcement.  

[Babsy47]

A coco cay type development in Baja would do for a destination.  I enjoy Catalina as a port just about as much as any, but it cannot handle more people and it requires tendering.  Ensenada would be good with the addition of a beach/pool destination near the port.  It would require a huge investment to build a dock and port like Coco Cay or Labadee in Baja, but one would think the market exists. 

[Cactus527]

Princess does a great West Coast itinerary of LA - Santa Barbara - San Francisco - San Diego - Ensenada - LA, or something like that. I would love to do this one sometime, but would love it even more if Royal did it.