Barcelona and the Port agree to eliminate two cruise terminals

BarcelonaJaume Collboni's government closed this Thursday one of the most complicated projects it had on the table. Barcelona City Council and the Port have reached an agreement to reduce the number of cruise ship terminals in the city from seven to five over the next five years. Both institutions have signed a new protocol that provides for the demolition of the port's current Terminals A, B, and C in exchange for the construction of a new, larger station at the latter with a capacity of up to 7,000 passengers at a time. Until now, these three terminals had a combined maximum capacity of 12,800 passengers at a time, an additional 5,800 of which will be accommodated at the new station.

At a press conference with the president of the Port, José Alberto Carbonell, the mayor of Barcelona celebrated that "for the first time in history, a limit has been placed on the growth of cruise ships" in Barcelona. With the city setting record numbers of cruise passengers—3.6 million in 2024—Collboni and Carbonell avoided making predictions about the number of passengers the port will accommodate in 2030, once the terminal reduction is complete. The mayor did emphasize that the infrastructure will lose 16% of its capacity overall.

City Council calculations predict that with the new protocol, the port's maximum capacity in 2030, if all terminals were operating at full capacity, would be 31,000 cruise passengers at a time, while without the terminal reduction, this figure would grow to 37,000. Collboni emphasized that the public will not notice an immediate impact from this announcement, but insisted that the decision to reduce infrastructure "obviously" will ultimately mean fewer cruise ship passengers passing through the city and will put an end to the current dynamic, in which passenger traffic has grown by 20% since 2018. For this reason, he thanked Carbonell for "the effort he's making to understand the city."

The agreement signed this Thursday also establishes that the future Terminal C will be public—the rest are private—which will allow for greater influence on the type of service offered. Carbonell explained that, in order to attract the desired type of service, priority will be given to cruise ships that use Barcelona as their home port, as well as smaller ships, which carry fewer cruise passengers at the same time. The Port's president argued that this strategy should help reduce the percentage of cruise ships that only make very short stays in the city, although he admitted that "Barcelona is not Miami" and, therefore, cannot aspire to 100% home port cruises.

Barcelona City Council and the Port have been negotiating this new protocol for over a year, with the aim of reducing the impact that cruise passengers have on the city. During the negotiation of the 2025 tax ordinances, the municipal government agreed with Barcelona en Comú on the scope of this reduction, with the commitment to close two cruise terminals.

The calendar

With the announcement of the new agreement, the countdown begins for a transformation of the port that will decisively change its configuration. The new protocol plans to demolish Terminal C by the end of 2026 and for construction of the new station to begin in 2027. The goal is for it to be fully operational by 2028, when Terminals A and B will be demolished. However, it won't be until 2030 that the new station will be fully operational and ready to accommodate 7,000 cruise passengers at a time. The redesign of this part of the Adossat dock will be accompanied by the renovation of the 610-meter section vacated by Terminals A and B, a space that will also be used to install new systems to connect ships to the electrical grid.

All of this will be accompanied by changes that are still pending from the previous protocol, signed in 2018 by the Ada Colau government with the Port. The Barcelona Sud dock terminal—the closest to the urban area—will also be closed by the end of 2026, and the new Terminal G, managed by Caribbean Group, is scheduled to open in spring 2027.

Changes in mobility

In order to mitigate the impact of cruise passengers on the city, the agreement signed by the City Council and the Port also includes a mobility improvement plan for the area. The city is working on a plan to create a promenade connecting the Drassanes and the Marina del Prat Vermell on foot, by bicycle, and by public transport. The Plaza de la Carbonera, which currently absorbs practically all of this traffic, is also a priority. The entire project—the new terminals, improved facilities, and urban transformations—will involve a public-private investment in the Port of Barcelona of €185 million.