Our Ship Has Come In
The Saturday Huddle is a weekly column that features opinion, analysis and reflections on Huddle stories, podcasts and business news in the region. Mark Leger is the editor of Huddle and the Director of News Content for Acadia Broadcasting.
It’s peculiar what can pass for a culturally resonant moment. There I was at the water’s edge on a cold, windy, foggy, rainy Thursday night, peering out into the Saint John harbour waiting to catch a glimpse of the first cruise ship to enter the port in nearly two years.
But I wasn’t alone at Tin Can Beach, a small public park near the tip of Saint John’s southern peninsula. When I arrived, the parking lot was already full of cars and I edged into the final available spot. Most people remained in their cars, drive-in style, as the Regent Seven Seas Navigator came into view.
I got out of my car and walked around, looking to chat with people who braved the weather late at night to greet the ship. As you can imagine, only a few of them left the confines of their heated cars to face bracing winds.
One woman owes her job, in part, to the industry. She works for a cleaning company that does residential and commercial work; this year it will help clean the Marco Polo and Diamond Jubilee terminals on days when ships are in port.
“It’s my first cruise season,” she told me.
RELATED: Fireworks Will Welcome Saint John’s First Cruise Ship In More Than Two Years
It was a relatively quiet, but much-anticipated start to the new cruise season. The Regent ship is smaller than the many larger ships that will dock here over the coming months. There were 124 passengers on board, with a capacity of 482; Saint John was one stop on a voyage from Boston that will take them to Halifax, Charlottetown, Sydney, and Corner Brook.
Halifax also greeted its first ship early this week, with the arrival of the Norwegian Getaway, carrying 1,500 of its 4,000-passenger capacity.
On Thursday night, I was part of the unofficial greeting committee in Saint John. Huddle associate editor Trevor Nichols was on the scene in Halifax on Tuesday, where he witnessed the official greeting committee welcome the first cruise passengers with much fanfare.
“As the first passengers left the Getaway just after 8:30, port officials and other tourism-industry players were there to greet them with applause,” Trevor wrote. “It might have been slightly bewildering to the passengers, but anyone familiar with cruise ships’ economic impact would understand the enthusiasm.”
It’s been a long two and half years for companies and communities with a stake in the cruise sector, mainly in Saint John and Halifax, but cruise passengers do also travel to outlying areas to sightsee and do activities.
Trevor spoke to one woman who was looking forward to seeing the lighthouse at Peggy’s Cove. “I’ve always wanted to come here,” Katrina Stewart said. “I’m thrilled that this is one of our stops.”
RELATED: Cruise Economy Ramps Back Up As Halifax’s New Season Kicks Off
The cruise industry has a significant economic impact in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.
David Duplisea, the CEO of the Saint John Region Chamber of Commerce, told Huddle reporter Tyler Mclean the net benefit to New Brunswick from cruise passengers was around $50-million in the year before the pandemic.
“This is the first thing that really signals that we are getting back to some kind of normalcy here, in the region, for cruise ships, it’s a very welcome sight in the harbour,” Duplisea told Tyler.
In his story, Trevor reports that Nova Scotia also receives a significant economic boost during the cruise ship season. In 2018, the total economic output from the industry was close to $172-million. The industry created jobs 950 jobs, $45.5-million in wages, and generated $14-million in taxes.
Of course, it will take time to return to the growth that was underway prior to the pandemic. Halifax was poised for a big year in 2020. The city was scheduled to receive 208 ships with more than 350,000 passengers, generating nearly $80-million of economic activity.
This year, the city will receive 152 ships, down from 179 in 2019. Saint John expects 70 cruise ship visits between now and early November.
The passenger numbers were down on both ships that came into Saint John and Halifax, and the ship traffic won’t increase significantly until the summer months. Captain Allan Gray, the CEO of Port Halifax, told Trevor the slow start may benefit the companies and communities that rely on the industry.
“The positive is it allows the industry time to come back,” he said. “The tour operators, and even managing the protocols, we have an opportunity to slowly build up. And I think by the fall we’ll start to see passenger numbers climb—that’s the positive.”
RELATED: When Will Our Ship Come Back In?
I live two streets over from the cruise ship terminals and have written before about the impact of the industry on the city centre here. The ships are a looming presence and the passengers add vitality to the streets, shops, bars, and restaurants.
“When you get a three-ship day in the uptown, you feel like you’ve been transported to maybe New York. It’s just so busy in the uptown area and there’s a huge dynamic and an energy. It’s just fantastic,” said Saint John Mayor Donna Reardon.
As I wrote this column on Friday afternoon, I sat by my upstairs window looking out at the departing ship. There was a “tugboat water show” as part of the send-off. There was supposed to be a fireworks display that greeted the ship when it arrived Thursday night but it was cancelled because of the weather.
There may not have been fireworks but, hopefully, the return of the cruise ships will provide a spark the region’s tourism economy really needs.