Carnival Cruise Lines announced today that it is reversing its decision to leave the Port of Baltimore. Instead, Carnival’s Baltimore-based cruise liner will take a short hiatus to be upgraded.
In June, Carnival said it would stop running cruises out of Baltimore. Complying with new, stricter environmental standards would be too costly, the company said.
The Baltimore-based ship Carnival Pride will still leave for Florida in November, but just until it can be upgraded to meet with the new EPA standards. It will be back in Baltimore to resume operations in early 2015.
Carnival Pride is just one of 32 ships in the company’s fleet that will be retrofitted with new scrubber technology to produce cleaner emissions, at a price tag of about $180 million total. It will also get upgraded facilities, including new restaurants.
Terry Thornton from Carnival says sailing from Baltimore attracts new customers from nearby states. “They can hop in their car, they can be here quickly, the port operates very efficiently for them,” says Thornton. “And once they park their car, their vacation starts.”
The cruising industry accounts for about 500 jobs in Maryland, about 220 of them directly at the port.
