The Balearic Islands open the door to more cruises in Palma in low season. The new Balearic president, Marga Prohens, met this Wednesday with the national director of the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), Alfredo Serrano, and at the meeting they commented that the Balearic Government will study the possibility of encouraging the arrival of more ships in the low season months.
There is currently an agreement between the authorities of the Balearic Islands and the association that brings together cruise ships so that only a maximum of three cruise ships per day dock in the port of Palma and that only one of them has more than 10,000 passengers on board. Palma is, along with Dubrovnik, the only two cities in the Mediterranean that have approved limitations in the face of the enormous human congestion that the city center suffers when more ships arrive.
In the meeting between Prohens and Serrano, in which the Balearic Minister of Tourism, Jaume Bauzà, has also been present, it has been decided to maintain the programming already agreed for the 2023-2024 season, but the door is open for, from 2025 , more boats can arrive in spring, autumn and winter.
The Government of Marga Prohens assures in a statement that the meeting has opened a “space for dialogue” with the sector to “defend” this type of tourism due to its impact on commerce, restaurants and other sectors. The Government also reports that there is interest in encouraging less polluting modalities and the management of the flows of boats and visitors for a staggered arrival to the islands’ ports “in favor of deseasonalization, and avoiding a feeling of saturation for the residents”.
The Government had already raised the possibility of expanding the number of moorings in Palma, but in today’s meeting the desire to do so from 2025 onwards in the least saturated times of the year was confirmed. The simultaneous arrival of cruise ships in Palma collapses the vicinity of the cathedral and the center, into an axis of half a dozen streets in which it is difficult to move when there are three ships docked.
The expansion of cruise calls in Palma coincides with important changes in the tourist regulations that Prohens is preparing to lift the current moratorium on new places imposed by his predecessor, Francina Armengol. The PP program also includes the possibility of allowing the expansion of hotels and, therefore, of hotel beds, in exchange for tourist establishments increasing their category.
