By
Rebecca Gibson |
Portland Port, located in England, is to extend its cruise berth, enabling it to become one of the few English Channel ports with the capacity to handle some of the industry’s largest ships.
Developed to accommodate ships of up to 340 metres in length, the new berth will have a minimum water depth of 9.6m and high capacity pneumatic floating fenders. It will also feature new, heavy-duty mooring and breasting dolphins, as well as a suite of 150 ton mooring bollards on both its existing berth and the new dolphins.
The fully modelled plan has been finalised and work on the first of the new mooring bollards is expected to start this spring. The new berth is expected to be operational by spring 2016.
“This is a major investment for the port and has the clear aim of securing the port's position within the cruise sector,” said Ian McQuade, Portland Port’s general manager of business development. “Portland Port has seen record figures for cruise calls and passengers in both 2013 and 2014, while 2015 is looking good exceed these numbers again. With a berth capable of handling ships up to 340m from 2016, the future looks very bright.”
Portland will promote plans for its new berth at Cruise Shipping Miami, which will be held from 10-13 March at Miami Beach, US.
“This event is the major show case of the year for the cruise industry and will give us the opportunity to brief all the cruise lines face to face on the berth extension,” said McQuade. “Planning will soon be starting for 2016 and we want to ensure that Portland Port gets full consideration for inclusion in as many 2016 itineraries as possible.”