With passenger volumes on the rise at Canada Place, is it just a matter of time before Delta will be home to a cruise ship terminal?
It’s going to be a few months until the Port of Vancouver indicates if it’s any closer to deciding to build a second Lower Mainland cruise ship terminal on the banks of the Fraser River.
Asked for an update, a port spokesperson said there’s nothing new to pass along but more information should be on the way in the first quarter of next year.
The port authority this week celebrated the final cruise ship that set sail from Canada Place for the 2019 season, marking the end of the 33rd cruise season at the downtown terminal.
In 2019, Vancouver welcomed more than one million cruise passengers on 288 ships, a 22 per cent increase in passenger volume over 2018.
Cruise is a key economic driver for the region and each ship that visits Vancouver stimulates about $3 million in direct activity to the local economy, according to the port.
Saying it’s early in the process and no decision has been made to even proceed with a second Lower Mainland cruise ship terminal, the port authority has been looking at the feasibility of a new facility in Delta or Richmond.
The port has already conducted a preliminary study on potential sites.
Port president and CEO Robin Silvester in an interview this summer that building a man-made island, as would be the case for the proposed Terminal 2 container facility at Roberts Bank, would be an enormous undertaking, so a cruise ship terminal on existing land along the Fraser River could be a good option.
“It’s a long process and there’s no easy answer. It would be a long-term project, not a short-term project, and there’s a lot of work going on. We’re still in the pretty early stages, but we are looking at the feasibility of a site on the Fraser River,” said Silvester.
“We are looking at all the options but if we wanted to something in the medium-term, it would need to be an option based on where we have land available. So, we’re looking at the medium-term while still doing conceptual work on the very long-term as well.”
The 2020 cruise ship season kicks off April 2.
