Business leaders are calling on the NSW state government to hold a summit to end Sydney Harbour’s gridlock that led two liners to anchor and disembark passengers on tender.
The plight of passengers aboard Royal Caribbean’s Quantum of the Seas and Carnival’s Luminosa, forced to ride at anchor after a cyclone forced them to sail into Sydney, has sparked a fresh debate over how the city solves its popularity as Australia’s number one cruise destination.
Business Sydney, one of the premier business organisations, The Daily Telegraph and tourism groups are banding together to try and persuade the government to tackle Sydney Harbour’s gridlock.
In an exclusive article in Cruise Passenger, the group calls for a summit of all the players to try and come up with a solution to Sydney Harbour’s gridlock.
Like the Pacific Islands
Sydney Business executive director Paul Nicolaou says in an article on Cruise Passenger: “It’s not a good look for our city to see passengers being shuttled ashore in a Pacific Islands style tendering operation.”
He adds: “If it’s not rocket science that cruise devotees want the Sydney experience first and foremost, it’s equally not rocket science that we need to find a Sydney Harbour solution.
“And this is why Business Sydney continues to advocate for shared access at Garden Island during the peak of the main cruise season.”
His call is being backed by The Daily Telegraph, which this week maintained the Luminosa case had “embarrassingly exposed” the city’s dilemma over the growing cruise industry.
“Between now and the end of March, more than 10 cruise ships will have to anchor in Athol Bay because no berth is available.”
“Transport Minister Jo Haylen in October ruled out the NSW Government pursuing using Garden Island to accommodate cruise ships during peak season, due to the presence of the navy.”
A third terminal for Sydney Harbour has been mooted for years. But the best alternatives, Garden Island and Port Botany, are being rejected for political and military reasons.
The Navy has consistently ruled out sharing Garden Island, even though it has done so in the past with Cunard’s Queen Mary II the last ship to use the facility. Port Botany was rejected after a residents’ campaign, and the now Labor state government is unlikely to force the issue in heartland constituencies.
NSW Ports
NSW Ports is pragmatic. After years of pursuing Garden Island as the obvious option, it is now suggesting locally homeported vessels sailing out of Wollongong, while those with largely international guests get the Overseas Passenger Terminal and those Opera House and Harbour Bridge views so desired by American and European guests.
However, Port Kembla would require infrastructure spending and transport improvements.
The outlook doesn’t appear hopeful. Transport Minister Jo Haylen says NSW Ports are looking into solutions. Canberra is looking the other way, and the Navy is battening down the hatches to defend a naval base at Garden Island with some of the best and most expensive views in the world.
Read the Sydney Business article here
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This embarrassment has occurred before – several times! The cause is the sale of the Finger Wharf (Wooloomooloo 7) which transpired when the MSB was corporatised to become Sydney Ports. The appropriation of Pyrmont 13 and other wharf space west of the bridge is almost as bad an outcome. If we don’t come to a rational plan for OUR harbour we will end up with a private yacht basin where even the ferries might have to fend off attacks from NIMBY interests as the harbour cruise trade has had to do and no doubt will continue to confront.
The fastest way for a newly corporatised entity to show a profit is to sell an asset. I believe that the Finger Wharf sold for 39M. Proposals for ships of the sizes we are now seeing were known or anticipated at the time as was the “Phoenix World City” project. There is a limit to what will fit under the bridge and Pacific Adventure would be at that limit. That we need capacity east of the bridge was obvious. The decision-makers of the time must have believed that Fairstar would remain our only resident cruise ship for the rest of forever! That cruising would grow was also self-evident.
Covetous eyes are again focused on Garden Island. Most people do not understand that the Navy is not just G.I. as there are facilities all over Sydney that support the Navy. War is being talked about as though it is inevitable. Can we ask the Navy to put themselves in harm’s way after first chasing them out of their natural home for the sake of our failure to preserve the facilities we already owned? Even if they could move to Jervis Bay; greedy developers would encroach if they haven’t already as they did with Sydney Airport. A 24-hour city needs a 24-hour airport! The majority of those who protest about noise probably fly when it suits from where? We are ruining prime agricultural land for Western Sydney Airport and now seek to do much the same thing to Garden Island.
The finger Wharf is a lousy development anyway! Unless you own a unit at the far end you have a view of either the pool or the side of a warship! RESUME THE FINGER WHARF! That is the ANSWER! It won’t be cheap but it CAN and SHOULD be done. There are sites nearby that could be redeveloped as an exchange for the sake of those silly enough to live there. Even the surplus St. James tunnels could be utilised to support a new terminal at the Finger Wharf.
I have made representations to the Minister before today but these things rarely get past the firewall of officials. The only way to get the attention of our political masters is a campaign of eye-watering annoyance! I sincerely hope that Cruise Passenger will not align itself with those factions who seek to deprive OUR NAVY of its natural home and its associated support facilities. Let’s not forget that there is a dry dock on G.I. There used to be one at Newcastle but now the area is a yacht basin for unemployed watercraft! Newcastle, there is another disgrace!
For those who do support the removal of the navy from Garden Island; the shame is all yours.
Whatever may yet be decided; I will NOT go to woolongang to join a cruise under any circumstances! Nor will I concede anything to international passengers. The buck stops with Sydney Ports who created this problem and who must now rsolve it. Reacquiring the Finger Wharf is the only viable option unless you want to build a mid-harbour pontoon lnked by an underwater tunnel? I think taking back what was always hours might be cheaper. Perhaps the Navy could help out by using the development on the Finger Wharf for target practice? They can have Newcastle too!
We’ve been docked in operational Navy ports in other countries. Japan and France immediately come to mind. So what’s the big deal?
Garden Island is know with the Defence Establish as GIDP aka Garden Island Defence Precinct.
If you want to berth commerial passenger ships in a Defence Precinct be my guess, however I would suggest your passengers increase their travel insurance. But remember Acts of War are not covered by any type of insurance.
I also need to add that there’s NOTHING WRONG with having the cruise ships anchor in the bay and transport them into the Warf or pontoon ,letting them off there to go and do whatever they want. It’s just NOT a negative look at all , it’s just another casual way of doing things .
If you develop another Passenger Terminal , then there’s all the EXTRA MAINTENANCE COSTS , and OPERATIONAL COSTS associated with those terminals and of course extra normal everyday associated costs that go along with those, security ect, ect !
And don’t forget about the entail engineering ,development and construction costs!! Just hate to think what the hell that would run into !! Let’s say anywhere between half and billion to one huge billion. It’s better spent on cleaning up people living rough, homeless lives in cars, streets ,parks around your city’s , and suburbs .
Garden Island must be left as it is , we don’t want even the slightest hint of tourism in that erea , particularly given that we have our own operational Ship Graving Caisson Locks Drydock there. We don’t want to put that at risk ,because once you start letting cruise ships Dock there with cruise passengers on it , then there’s a risk of anitiation of development and we don’t want to risk loosing our Caisson Lock Dry Dock as it’s one of the last operational of its type in our country.
Now to the other side of things for the Dry Dock, if the cruise ship company’s want to use it maintain their ships for a large maintenance schedular of jobs that need to be done, e.g. taking out propellor shafts, seals, propellers , rudders along wth their shafts, new fresh paint jobs , interior refits , yea that’s what we need cruise ships in that erea for.
These so called business leaders in the city don’t give a right boot about these types of things as they don’t make them any money, and don’t generate anything for them personally or their business partners . But if they were to consider that if they could arrange with the shipping crusielines to bring a full load of passengers for Australian holidays having them come into the Sydney Passenger Terminal , offload all their passengers at a time when it’s due for a huge DryDock Maintenance , arranged with Garden Island Dry Dock Operations officials well in advance , that would generate them revenues .
Then again after the Caisson Lock DryDock Maintenance is complete they can then come back down into the Sydney Cruise Terminal ,then replenish supply’s from Australia wide , NSW and local Businesses , take on another full load of passenger bookings , processing and anything eles that goes along with that , and once again will generate lots of revenues for the city and surrounding ereas. I think you’d find that most of them would have city Hotels ,tours, restaurants booked in advance so they’d all generate revenues in those ways.
Newcastle had been promised a cruise terminal bollards have been placed but funding. It had been withdrawn. Ask our Labor and Liberal politicians where is the funding gone to.
It’s a disgrace. Our Governments regularly refer to Sydney as a “World City”. We if that statement is true then Sydney deserves a new state of the art cruise terminal that is future proof and can handle 2 Oasis/Icon class ships. However, in reality I think we all know that Sydney is degenerating into a third world city where the residents have to conserve electricity on hot days and sit in their sweltering houses too scared to turn on their air conditioning. If we can’t get the simple things right what hope is there for a new cruise terminal that will generate billions for the economy. Our governments are running the place into the ground.