Ports of paradise feel the squeeze

By Michele Kayal
Advertiser Staff Writer

As Hawai'i gears up for a cruise explosion, engineers and industry executives are looking for ways to get the biggest ships into the smallest harbors.

The 963-foot Queen Elizabeth 2 has been calling in Honolulu, as well as Hilo, for decades. With bigger liners and more regular calls on the horizon, it will be like fitting more SUVs into a garage built for Beetles. Advertiser library photo • Jan. 23, 2001

The state has set aside roughly $30 million for harbor improvements through 2003 in the budget that becomes effective today. The projects in Honolulu, Hilo and Nawiliwili, deemed the most urgent by the industry, are aimed at lengthening piers or building passenger facilities to accommodate an increasing number of ships that are hundreds of feet longer than ever anticipated, with hundreds more passengers than in the past.

Hawai'i has been squeezing large ships into its harbors for decades but, with the exception of Honolulu, most can handle only one at a time. Push will come to shove in 2003, cruise executives say, when more than 500 international calls are scheduled and Hawai'i becomes the home port for four ships, two of which are 840 feet or longer — bigger than even Honolulu was originally designed for.

Without the right facilities, industry experts say, Hawai'i could start losing business.

"On many days already in your peak season you're getting two (large) ships, and we want to assure you're not losing traffic as we replace the older ships with the new ones," said Michael Ronan, director of destination development for Royal Caribbean International and Celebrity Cruises, who also heads a cruise industry group that has worked on these issues with the state for about 18 months. "If you don't do it now, there is the very real possibility that the planned use of ships to Hawai'i for 2003 would go away."

The projects in the current budget are only the first step of what a state-commissioned study said are nearly $100 million worth of changes needed by 2020 to support a vibrant Hawai'i cruise industry. But even when they're finished, it is unclear whether Hilo and Nawiliwili will be able to accommodate more than one of the industry's largest vessels at a time.

Too close for comfort

Over the last decade, cruise ships have gone from an average length of 600-700 feet to nearly 1,000 feet. Most of the four dozen new ships joining the worldwide fleet between now and 2004 will be "mega-ships" — vessels up to 965 feet long, and sometimes so wide they cannot fit through the Panama Canal.

Hawai'i's harbors, many of which date to the 1930s, were built for smaller, simpler times, when the Neighbor Islands saw mostly cargo and sugar ships. The largest harbor in the state, Honolulu, was designed to take passenger vessels only 820 feet long, and relatively small harbors, such as Nawiliwili, were designed to accommodate ships less than 500 feet long.

"In the case of Hawai'i, anything over 600 is large," said Bill Anonsen, vice president of maritime affairs for American Classic Voyages, which sails the 704-foot Patriot and the 682-foot Independence around the Islands each week. When the harbors were designed, Anonsen said, "they didn't think they'd see ships that much bigger, or hadn't really given it that much thought."

Over the years, tugboat assistance, skilled captains and harbor pilots, and advancing propulsion technology have helped supersized ships squeeze into places they were never meant to go.

The Queen Elizabeth 2, a 963-foot behemoth built in 1969, has been calling at Honolulu and Hilo for decades. In March, Celebrity's 965-foot Infinity became the first of the industry's new mega-ships to visit Hawai'i. It will be followed in October by Royal Caribbean's 962-foot Radiance of the Seas and Carnival Cruise Lines' 963-foot Spirit, and in December by Norwegian Cruise Line's 965-foot Star.

But industry officials say that the trouble for many ports comes when more than one of these monsters want to call at a time, a situation that will become more common by 2003. Between now and then, the number of port calls by international lines will more than double to 532, and more of the ships will be longer than 960 feet.

More berths also will be taken up by Hawai'i's own home fleet, which will grow larger in number and size. Norwegian's Star will be based here, once it starts calling at the end of the year. And American Classic will add a third ship to its fleet in 2003, a brand new 840-foot ship out of Mississippi. A second ship of the same size will be added in 2004.

In addition to the maritime traffic jam that could result as ships jockey for the scarce docking facilities big enough to take them, the passengers could stack up as well. The giant vessels carry about 2,200 passengers, hundreds more than harbor facilities ever imagined having to handle at once.

Efforts to expand

Honolulu has enough dock space to moor three of the 965-foot ships at a time, and can take four if it has to. But industry officials and engineers say that it cannot handle the passenger traffic. The $20 million budgeted for Honolulu will convert half of an existing cargo shed into a terminal that can handle 8,000 passengers a day — enough to see two of the mega-ships drop off passengers from one cruise, and fill up with those for the next.

Hilo, a decades-old sugar port, can fit a 965-foot ship at its 1,200-foot-long pier. But a second ship can be no longer than 700 feet. Last year, the harbor actually turned away two ships because of that conflict, said Hilo harbor master Ian Birnie.

The state has budgeted $3.35 million for a pier extension there that would allow a second ship to be larger, but how much larger is still under review, said Department of Transportation spokeswoman Marilyn Kali.

"We have to design it first and that hasn't happened," Kali said. "It's still in the planning stage."

Nawiliwili is perhaps the most problematic of Hawai'i's ports. A snaggly S-shaped entrance to the harbor makes it difficult for the super-long ships to enter, and harbor pilots have refused to bring the vessels in. Celebrity's Infinity was turned away twice this year. The pilots have been meeting with transportation officials and cruise executives to resolve the issue.

But even if the ships were to enter, there is only enough dock space for one of them. A second ship can be no longer than 720 feet. The $6.5 million earmarked for improvements at Nawiliwili will lengthen the pier, but again, it is unclear by how much.

"We'd like to have two ships in there, but we're not sure we can fit two ships," said Thomas Fujikawa, the state's harbors administrator. "We're talking to the cruise industry about what we should do. We're not sure yet."

Officials at the state Department of Transportation said the projects at all three harbors should be completed during 2003.

A $440,000 study commissioned by the Transportation Department from consultants Leo A. Daly in 1999 estimated the harbors will need $54 million in improvements by 2005, and another $43 million by 2020 to accommodate the projected growth in Hawai'i's cruise industry.

Uneasy investments

Hawai'i is not alone in playing catch up to the worldwide cruise explosion. The industry has been growing at an average annual rate of 8 percent, and ports from Quebec to Florida to Galveston to Seattle have begun massive renovations to attract and keep the ships calling.

"With the larger ships in the last decade, ports really have had to look at themselves and say how can we accommodate the physical increase of these ships — and it's mostly been a length issue — and the volume of passengers, particularly with home ports," said Scott Lagueux, a partner at Miami-based cruise consulting firm Bermello, Ajamil and Partners. "If they want to be in the industry, they've really had to take a hard look at themselves and find out what they're willing to spend to make sure that business stays there."

Experts put Hawai'i's development roughly between Miami, the largest year-round port in the world with 17 ships in residence, and the east coast of Canada, which has just begun to invest in anticipation of arriving vessels.

Ports at similar stages of development as Hawai'i have begun making large investments. Vancouver, for instance, is spending about $58 million, according to the American Association of Port Authorities, to add a berth and expand the dock and terminals. The Port of Boston has allocated $12 million to build a new terminal for the mega ships, and Florida's Port Everglades is spending $10 million to expand facilities for the new ships.

In most cases, as in Hawai'i's, it is the destination or the port that pays for the improvements. The payback will come, they figure, from the money that visitors spend in port, and from the fees and taxes paid by the industry. Increasingly uneasy about making such large investments, some places have begun to get guarantees from the industry, assuring that if they build it, the ships will come.

The state of Hawai'i has not secured any guarantees from the industry for its planned improvements, Kali said.

Some destinations have begun dabbling in capital advancement from the industry. In Seward, Alaska, the cruise lines recently put up $1 million for harbor improvements, to be paid back in the future, said John Hansen, president of the North West CruiseShip Association.

Gov. Ben Cayetano signed a law last week that will allow similar deals to take place in Hawai'i.

Industry executives hold up their own large investment in ships and advertising as a guarantee that ships will come, and say the destinations will reap the benefits of their investments through fees, taxes, and visitor spending.

"It's true ships can move elsewhere, but they're investing a lot in advertising to make sure the passengers are going to come and make sure the experience provided is a good one," Hansen said. "The guarantee really is that the business will continue to grow. As long as the visitors want to come, the ships will be there and they'll be paying for the facilities."

Michele Kayal can be reached at mkayal@honoluluadvertiser.com.