San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
B STREET • Passenger fee to finance the $5M needed for project
Key moments in city’s cruise ship industry
November 1970: The first cruise ship to offer scheduled cruises from San Diego after the inception of the Port District — the Greek M/S Orpheus — begins making scheduled 10day cruises to Mexico from the B Street and Broadway piers.
1972: The Broadway Pier is converted into a multiuse public maritime pier and landscaped esplanade along with a cruise ship embarkation platform at a cost of $673,000.
Early 1978: Pacific Princess, the most well-known cruise ship afloat, docks at the Broadway Pier to pick up passengers before voyaging through the Panama Canal and on to the West Indies.
1985: The Port completes a $3.5 million refurbishment of the B Street Pier and warehouse into an updated cruise ship terminal.
1991: The Port recognizes a larger facility is needed and authorizes design work for a $96 million terminal on B Street.
1993: State bans gambling on ships that stop at more than one California port, leading to a sharp downturn in cruise ship business. Shortly thereafter, the Port abandons the proposed $96 million terminal project.
1996: Federal legislation is signed into law rescinding the gambling ban.
July 2004: The Port begins a market analysis for redeveloping the B Street Cruise Ship Terminal for commercial development and parking.
June 2005: Port invites prospective Lane Field developers to include a new cruise ship terminal on B Street as part of their bid.
December 2005: Port determines B Street development needs to be a stand-alone project.
June 2006: Port begins consideration of constructing a terminal building on Broadway Pier to handle overflow cruise ship arrivals.
2008: San Diego cruise industry peaks, with passenger volumes approaching 1 million.
August 2009: The Port of San Diego breaks ground on a 52,000-square-foot cruise ship terminal and event center on Broadway Pier.
December 2010: officially opens.
2011: Passenger volumes start to fall amid concerns about violence in Mexico.
2014: The number of passengers sailing out San Diego bottoms out at 170,000.
2019-2020: Port in talks with Carnival Corp. and Disney Cruise Line about helping finance a $40 million remodel of B Street terminal, including new gangway system.
November 2022: Port imposes a $5.50 fee that cruise lines pass on to each passenger to help finance $5 million remodel of B Street Terminal.
January 2024: Work to begin on the upgrade of B Street
Terminal
January 2025:
The new terminal on Broadway Pier Terminal upgrade expected to be completed
minal, but legislation at the time banning gambling on ships that stopped at more than one California port killed San Diego’s cruise business for a few years, along with the project.
More recently, the port had been in discussions, starting in 2019, with Disney Cruise Line and Carnival Corp., the parent company of Holland America, which home ports in San Diego, about a joint investment in a $40 million overhaul of B Street Terminal. That project would have included additional baggage facilities and a more sophisticated gangway system for entering cruise ships docked on the south berth, akin to what now exists on the north berth.
But then the pandemic hit in early 2020, and those plans were scrapped as cruise lines suspended talks about investing in land-side improvements, said Adam Deaton, who is the port’s cruise business representative.
“Seeing that it’s a short turnaround for this ($5 million) project vs. a 10-year project and the cruise lines aren’t in a position right now to do a big project, we didn’t want to get wrapped up in negotiating with them a full $5 million investment, which we knew we could raise on our own in two to three years,” Deaton said.
“This is about improving the embarkation experience inside the terminal by expanding the screening security area to handle more passengers, improving the overall aesthetic feel, putting in new restrooms, and expanding the overall space.”
The port is financing the work with a $5.50 passenger fee that was implemented in November. Construction is expected to start in early 2024, with completion targeted for a year later.
A key component of the rehab, which is currently in the design phase, involves demolishing a walled-off, 9,000square-foot space within the cavernous 125,000-squarefoot building. At one time an office for U.S. Customs and
Border Protection, the area will be redesigned to expand the check-in and waiting area that can become especially cramped when ships are docked on both the north and south sides of the pier.
“By demoing that area, we can move the south berth check-in to that area, and there will be room for more seating in the waiting area, when you’re waiting to board,” Deaton said. “The whole idea is to make the flow a lot quicker and less time lingering in the facility. You don’t want to be lingering in the terminal very long. You want to get on your cruise.”
The experience of boarding a cruise ship in San Diego can vary widely, depending on the day and how many vessels are in port. Processing more than 4,000 passengers boarding two cruise ships on the same day can, on occasion, contribute to delays. Deaton also noted that with the sharp ramp-up this year in passenger volumes, it took some time for the port to hire more personnel and train them.
Cruise lines now schedule staggered appointment times for boarding, but the system doesn’t always go according to plan. Complicating matters over the last several months, says Deaton, is an ongoing pier repair project that has disrupted traffic in and out of the pier area and constricted space, contributing to sometimes long lines and delayed embarkation.
The Union-tribune reached out to travelers who have taken cruises departing from San Diego, and their impressions of the boarding process varied widely, from smooth and trouble-free to chaotic and uncomfortable.
“We have been on over 20 cruises and this was one of the easiest and most efficient we’ve experienced,” San Diegan Sandy Myers said of her embarkation for a Mexican Riviera cruise she took in February.
Some commented on the appearance of the facility itself. “The terminal looks like a bare-bones warehouse both inside and out. There is nothing warm and welcoming about it,” said one passenger. Another, however, described the facility as
“very clean and orderly.”
When people are researching cruises for future travel, the focus is clearly on the destination and the cruise line, but the boarding experience still is a factor, says Colleen Mcdaniel, editor-in-chief of the online review site Cruise Critic.
“The experience of boarding a ship really sets the stage for the cruise, and it’s an important part of their cruise experience,” Mcdaniel said. “A lot of our member reviews include reviews on the embarkation and disembarkation processes, so it’s something they talk about and write about, and when it’s great, it’s less important because they don’t think about it.”
It’s not uncommon, she said, for the cruise lines to invest in terminal upgrades in major port cities, most notably in Miami, considered one of the busiest ports in the world.
“They’ve invested in building beautiful facilities, and if you’re waiting, you’re waiting in comfort as opposed to being in a warehouse,” Mcdaniel said. “Virgin has invested in Miami, where they opened a relatively new terminal and Norwegian Cruise Line has done the same. There you’ll see terminals dedicated to one cruise line, and it will feel very much like the ship.”
Holland America, which operates the most cruises out of San Diego, has taken steps to speed up the part of the boarding process where passengers check in with their cruise ship by implementing a facial recognition system. But cruise line president Gus Antorcha says there is room for improvement.
“I’m always concerned when the guest experience is impacted at a home port or on board the ship,” he said in a recent interview. “I’ve been to San Diego multiple times, and San Diego has its challenges, which we actively discuss with the port. It’s not always about the size of the terminal. Sometimes it’s the efficiency of the terminal.
“We’ve worked with the port with the check-in part, which is now down to minutes, so the front end works really fast, but the challenge in San Diego has a lot to do with getting people on and off the vessel. There were issues with the escalator and elevators, all well known to the port.”
So far this season, Holland America says, the elevators and escalator have not been an issue.
San Diego does have a second cruise ship terminal — the Port Pavilion on Broadway Pier — that was built in 2010, but it is rarely used for docking ships. It was originally designed more as an overflow facility for the B Street Terminal and is ill-suited for the increasingly larger ships now sailing today.
The Broadway terminal is a little less than half the size of the B Street facility, and the pier it sits on is 135 feet wide compared to the 400-foot width of B Street, Deaton said.
It’s not surprising then that there were just a dozen cruise calls at Broadway Pier in 2019, and only eight are expected this year. There were more last year — 15 — because of the construction work on B Street Pier that started last May.
The port does realize revenue from the terminal, which is frequently used for a variety of public and private events like weddings, proms and festivals. Projected revenue for this year is expected to exceed $320,000, similar to what was generated in 2019, before the pandemic, the port said.
“B street has always been our vision for the primary cruise ship terminal,” Deaton said. “While we would have loved to have had a brand new facility in the ’90s, we’re not quite there and it will take investment by the lines to get there. San Diego is a key port for Holland America and Disney, and they would like to have a new facility and a better experience, but the volumes aren’t there. And the industry is kind of still recovering from the pandemic
“When we first talked about a new cruise facility we were at a million passengers, and we’re not half there yet, at 460,000. Hopefully, we’ll get to that point someday.”
lori.weisberg@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @loriweisberg