MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Buenos Aires brand new exclusive terminal expects 140 cruise calls this season

Docking space for four cruises and facilities to handle 12.000 visitors

An estimated 140 cruise vessels will be calling in Buenos Aires this coming 2010/2011 season and on arrival visitors will be greeted at a refurbished terminal which should be ready for inauguration in December.

The Quinquela Martin Buenos Aires Port terminal once operational will be able to comfortably handle 12.000 passengers per day and will be of exclusive use for the cruise industry.

Terminales Rio de la Plata that has the Buenos Aires port concession has invested 22 million US dollars in the construction of the new terminal’s building with an area of 12.300 square metres, plus extending piers and docking capacity which means that instead of a single 300 metres long vessel, up to four cruises can simultaneously call in the capital of Argentina.

“Now we can say that the port of Buenos Aires has a specific area for cruise vessels, because until now the policy was that this is an enormous container port and occasionally for cruise vessels”, underlined Argentine Transport Secretary Juan Pablo Schiavi.

“In the last five years, the arrival of cruises has doubled and we have gone from 70 to the current 140, many of them longer than 300 meters. The arrival of cruise passengers has also doubled: today it stands at around 230.000”, said controller at the General Ports Authority, Oscar Vecslir.

The terminal building has two storeys: in the ground floor arrivals, luggage dispatch, coffee shops and other outlets. In the first floor Interpol, Customs, Migration (with 20 booths), General Ports Authority, Animal and Plant sanitary office plus 70 check in counters and pre-boarding lounges.

Arriving visitors and who are departing by air or remaining in Buenos Aires will circulate through one lane, while those in transit and returning on board later in the day will have their own exit.

The terminal also has a large esplanade with sufficient space for an orderly circulation of taxis and coaches.

The cruise industry in Argentina, as in the rest of the South Atlantic had had a spectacular development. Buenos Aires received 60.000 tourists in 2001 and last season the number 230.000.

The industry has also expanded regionally with a growing percentage of Latinamericans discovering sea travel and leisure, which has helped to mitigate the impact of the world recession.

Gustavo Figuerola, Terminales Rio de la Plata CEO said the cruise market this coming season can be expected to consolidate, and this is mainly because of the loss of the Chilean leg.

“There were ten vessels doing the Chile-Buenos Aires leg, but now are limited to Buenos Aires with a growing market among Argentines, Brazilians and Uruguayans”, said Figuerola.

He added that the world cruise market moves 12 million people every year, of which 600.000 are Brazilians which makes it “an exponential business, and with the new terminal Buenos Aires is prepared for the challenge”.

Terminales Rio de la Plata is made up of Dubai Port World with 56%; Mitsubi, 5% and the LIFE financial group 40%.

Figuerola revealed that Dubai Port World last week inaugurated a cruise terminal and piers in El Callao, Peru where it invested 500 million US dollars. The company also manages cruise ports in Dominican Republic; Vancouver, Canada and is beginning a similar investment in Santos, Brazil.