By
Alex Smith |
Stena Line has opened its new passenger terminal at Victoria Terminal 2 in Belfast Harbour in Northern Ireland following a £3 million ($3.47 million) extension and upgrade.
The project has expanded and refurbished the terminal to add new facilities to cater for increased passenger levels on the route from Belfast to Birkenhead, England. The building’s interior has been fully refurbished, including the addition of a new departure lounge with an increased capacity for approximately 200 people, as well as a new Barista café area and passenger waiting area. Externally, three new vehicle check-in booths have been installed, along with an extended queueing area for passengers in vehicles and coaches.
“It is great to see the next stage of the investment in our Belfast operations come to fruition,” said Paul Grant, Irish Sea trade director for Stena Line. “In partnership with Belfast Harbour, we have taken our old and dated building, with limited space, and totally modernised the design with a great new range of improved facilities. Customers using our new modern vessels needed a new modern terminal to serve them and now they have that, to ensure they get the best travel experience from departure to arrival.”
The upgrade project took more than a year to complete and was undertaken while maintaining current ferry services. Stena Line has launched two new ferries, Stena Edda and Stena Embla, on the Belfast-Birkenhead route, which have increased passenger and freight capacity by over a third.
“We are really pleased to see the newly refurbished Victoria Terminal 2 open to passengers after a significant investment from both Stena Line and Belfast Harbour,” said Michael Robinson, port director at Belfast Harbour. “We believe that providing modern facilities for our customers and investing in the Port’s core infrastructure is essential to supporting our partners’ ambitions, and to achieving our goal of becoming one of the world’s leading regional ports. As passenger traffic levels on Stena Line’s services continues to grow, we are committed to supporting our partners at Stena Line, as they meet increasing customer demand.”