The Port clashes with Collboni over the promise to end cruise ship calls

BarcelonaTen months after reaching an agreement to reduce cruise terminals, the Port and the Barcelona City Council once again have an open melon on the table. It was placed this Wednesday by the mayor, Jaume Collboni, when he defended in an interview with Betevé that he aspired for scale cruises – those that only spend a few hours in the city – to disappear completely in the coming years. This Thursday, from the Port, they have responded to the mayor, defending the importance of this type of vessel and emphasizing that eliminating them will not solve the problem of tourist overcrowding in the Catalan capital.

Sources from the port infrastructure emphasize that the cruise passengers Barcelona receives annually represent less than 5% of the city's total visitors, which is why they consider that "eliminating transit cruise passengers does not solve the saturation challenges". They also argue that this type of tourist "also brings wealth to Barcelona", and they present a report commissioned by the International Association of Cruise Lines (CLIA) from the University of Barcelona (UB) which maintained that transit cruise passengers contribute more to the municipal coffers than they cost.

In this regard, they point out that transit cruise passengers are the only visitors who pay the tourist tax despite not staying overnight in the city, unlike other excursionists who arrive by plane, train, or bus. The same sources also emphasize that the Port is already taking action to reduce the impact of cruise activity on the city with measures such as de-seasonality, de-concentration of visitor flows, and diversification of points of interest outside the most strained areas.

When the agreement to reduce terminals at the port was presented last July, the president of the infrastructure, José Alberto Carbonell, admitted that the reduction of terminals should help reduce the percentage of cruises that only make very short stays in the city. He warned, however, that "Barcelona is not Miami" and therefore cannot aspire to 100% homeport cruises, which is what Collboni is now proposing.

Criticism from the opposition

Collboni's announcement has been a kind of starting gun for the long pre-campaign for the 2027 municipal elections, and as such it has already received the reaction of the opposition groups, with criticism from both the right and the left. The leader of Junts in the council, Jordi Martí Galbis, has called the mayor's proposal a "weather balloon" and accused him of "selling smoke." From the PP, Daniel Sirera, has lashed out at the proposal and at the mayor: "The only tourism Collboni wants in Barcelona is people camping on the Ronda, in Ciutadella Park or in La Sagrera," he snapped.

Regarding Barcelona en Comú, councilor Carol Recio has lashed out at the contradictions that, in her opinion, Collboni falls into. Among them, defending at the same time the expansion of the airport and the reduction of cruise ships, or moving forward with a usage plan for Ciutat Vella that "expands tourist services" in the area. From ERC, the deputy spokesperson, Jordi Coronas, has considered Collboni's proposal to be "just an announcement" and has regretted that in the meantime the number of tourists continues to grow. He also stressed that "the only thing he has done to regulate tourism has been on ERC's initiative".

Despite the criticism, both groups are Collboni's main partners for negotiating the other announcement he put on the table this Wednesday: the increase in the next fiscal ordinances of the tourist surcharge for cruise ship passengers from the current 5 euros to 8, the legal maximum.