Construction of Hamburg’s fourth cruise terminal, at Kronprinzkai at Steinwerder, south of the river Elbe in the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Hafen, began on 4 July with a traditional ground-breaking ceremony. Along with the existing Altona and Hafencity facilities, the new Cruise Centre 3 will be operated by Hamburg Cruise Centre. When completed, the terminal will be able to process up to 8,000 passengers at any time, with separate embarkation and disembarkation facilities.
Hamburg’s cruise terminals will see 43 calls in August, handling an estimated 125,000 passengers. The busiest period generally for Hamburg coincides with the bi-annual Hamburg Cruise Days, with seven ships due in port: Delphin and Europa on 1 August, Gann, Aidastella, Deutschland and MSC Magnifica on 2 August and Aidaluna on3 August.
The marketing and sales function in respect of Deutschland has recently been taken over by FTI in the German, Austrian and Swiss travel agent markets. FTI, the fourth largest German tour operator, operates Berlin for its own account. With the number of cruise turn-rounds in Hamburg growing (and from 2016 Aidaprima will do so once a week), the new space will come on-stream at just the right time.
