Juneau residents will vote on more cruise ship restrictions

Wednesday, 09 Jul, 2024 0

A Juneau, Alaska voter initiative to restrict cruise ship visits has made the ballot and will be voted on later this year.

A recent attempt to put it to a local vote came up short of the required signatures.

The “ship-free Saturdays” proposal – if passed – would restrict ship visits of 250 or more passengers to six days a week.

It will now be on the October 1 municipal ballot.

The measure would also ban ships on July 4.

Juneau, with a population of about 32,000 have raised concerns since the pandemic of increased congestion and overcrowding downtown.

The move as been led by activist Karla Hart.

“I know what Juneau used to be, so I’m fighting to bring some of that back,” Hart said.

“Ship-free Saturdays is a way to just give everybody in Juneau one day a week without the blanket of impacts on our lives.”

Juneau recently adopted a voluntary limit on cruise ships that would cap passenger numbers at 16,000 a day starting in 2026.

Hart says this isn’t enough.

“Most days of the week, we don’t have 16,000 cruise passengers in Juneau, but we’re still overwhelmed with impacts,” she said.

In Sitka, another popular cruise port in Alaska, a local initiative to limit ship calls has failed.

This proposal would have limited cruise ship passenger numbers to 300,000 per year, which is about half of expected numbers this year.

TravelMole Editorial Team

Editor for TravelMole North America and Asia pacific regions. Ray is a highly experienced (15+ years) skilled journalist and editor predominantly in travel, hospitality and lifestyle working with a huge number of major market-leading brands. He has also cover in-depth news, interviews and features in general business, finance, tech and geopolitical issues for a select few major news outlets and publishers.

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