- The pandemic offered coastal communities across the US a taste of life without cruise ships.
- Now, port cities in Florida, Maine, Alaska, and California are fighting to limit or ban the vessels.
- Monterey, California and Juneau, Alaska are the latest US ports trying to scale back cruise tourism.
The pandemic offered coastal communities across the US a taste of life without cruise ships, one marked by cleaner water, fewer crowds, and lost jobs.
Now, port cities in Alaska, California, Maine, and Florida are fighting to permanently ban or limit the massive vessels dotting their shorelines due to residents' concerns about over-tourism and pollution.
Their initiatives, from every corner of the country's vast shoreline, underscore the challenges towns face as they attempt to reel back cruise tourism: most anchorages and piers used by cruise ships fall under federal jurisdiction, meaning local governments are legally limited in how they can restrict their comings and goings.
Monterey, California, a small coastal city two hours south of San Francisco, is the latest US port to push back against the multi-billion dollar cruise industry. In February, its city council voted to terminate passenger landing services provided by the city to visiting ships, claiming they pose environmental risks to Monterey Bay, a national marine sanctuary.
While the move isn't a blanket ban on the vessels, it makes disembarkment a costly and complicated challenge for cruise lines who choose to visit.
A few weeks prior, Juneau, Alaska's city assembly voted to cap the number of cruise ships visiting the capital's downtown port at five per day. While some residents voiced support for more stringent restrictions, assembly member Maria Gladziszewski said anything more would result in "immediate" litigation.
The cruise industry's legal power is a real fear for the city — Juneau was previously sued for charging $8 passenger fees, resulting in a costly three-year lawsuit.
Some business owners argue that cruise bans will have a negative impact on the local economy. Bar Harbor, a small coastal town in Maine that serves as the gateway Acadia National Park, was sued by local businesses this January after the town approved a citizens petition to cap disembarking cruise visitors to 1,000 per day.
But how much cruise passengers actually spend upon disembarkment is unclear. According to one study commissioned by Stand.earth, an environmental organization, found that cruise passengers visiting Victoria, a major Canadian cruise port, were responsible for less than 2% of tourism spending.
On the opposite end of the Eastern Seaboard, a similar battle has long been underway. Key West, an island in Florida with approximately 26,000 permanent residents, has been attempting to limit local cruise traffic since 2020, when locals overwhelmingly voted to cap the number of daily cruise ship passengers, ban larger cruise ships, and give preference to cruise lines with the best environmental record.
Despite all three measures being approved by over 60% of voters, the fight didn't end there. In 2021, the Florida state legislature passed a bill ruling that local ballots and referendums cannot be used to restrict maritime commerce, effectively overruling Key West's vote. The next year, city officials passed an ordinance banning cruise ships from Key West's public piers and redirecting ship traffic to a private dock — a measure that soon attracted state scrutiny.
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