Nice Carib cruise shipping colums

[Bricktop]

Keep yapping...

[Don1]

juss di fax yuteman....irrefutable

[Don1]

This I don't understand

Seems to be a non sequitur

[Bricktop]

What is irrefutable is that tourists go to duty free stores & attractions...they aren't walking around in "over the hill" in Bahamas or "flankers" in Mobay and they definitely are not walking anywhere in St. Thomas...those are the facts...

[Don1]

Your thinking is still the limited Jamaican varietal

If your chosen model is "garrison tourism" as in the all inclusive model that is certainly a way to go.... it's sub-optimal but it is a way

The more evolved development planners prefer to create an environment where people do not have to be herded in attraction warehouses where very little money circulates outside and we're denied the full multiplier effect.... but an environment where the paunchy visitors feel free to walk around without supervision. This is even moreso when iit's funded by borrowed funds in a strapped economy

No way Government should be borrowing hundreds of millions to subsidize wealthy cruise lines, in bond merchants and dolphin caretakers...with a mere pittance trickling to those like the 40 workers at "your company" Dat name corporate welfare with a very low ROI

Let them spend their own money for the trinket seeker receiving facility... ah suh di ting fi werk

[Bricktop]

The level of disorder, mass criminality and decrepit infrastructure in the USVI & Bahamas is no way comparable to that in Jamaica... UN & CIA statistics establish that fact...

My point is made...

So what was this all about?

[Don1]

Less disorder, dilapidation & destruction = More tourists disembarking & more inclined to spend money...voila... Jamaica itself is THE attraction....not some sequestered built environment hemming in the waddling Americans

It's self evident

[Willi]

Or follow thru on even the suboptimal investment by installing a police post there and enforcing order by any means...eventually people would learn and conform.

Things like the taxi list Bricky showed could have been done and the GOJ should have done the promised refurbishment. Typical, they fail at the last 5% when having done the 95% effort.

[Willi]

Not really, We could do faaar better with forward thinking.

Wi chupid!

[Bricktop]

Where are they spending the money when they disembark in Bahamas & USVI?

[Willi]

They still disembark in Nassau?

I hear that the US put them on the critical crime list...

We have a prime opportunity for the GOJ and Cruise line to come together and patch up Falmouth and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

The competition islands are cesspools and if we just do the 5%, we can have EXPLOSIVE growth.

Give us vision lest we perish...

[Assasin]

thank you. Tell that to mi brethren deh. The first thing any serious tourism town would do is address the problems the guests site consistently which are basic.

[Willi]

Sass, you are both arging differnt things.

Don is saying we should NEVER have invested in the first place as we have better, more pressing opportunities for that money with more profound returns.

You are saying that since we invested the bulk, we should maximize the returns by following thru. I dont think he disagrees with that, Certainly since we are locked into the investment the current imperative is to juice it for all its worth. We dont have the luxury of sunk cost thinking, as the investment is not dead, just sub-optimal for us at this stage.

However, he is free to proffer that we should never have gotten in in the 1st place and that we need to ensure we don't do similar in the near future...

[Don1]

What is new?? Are you for real???????

The Govt. is bankrupt and the World is in recession when this expenditure of over US$200 Million is committed to

I could say from then ( circa 2008) that this thing was a sub-optimal investment. Cruising even in the BEST circumstances in the Caribbean is NOT a particularly great investment for the destination... Jamaica's condition makes it less optimal than most. I can think of dozens of investments that would have 10X the ROI of that trinket foolishness.

The Cruise Line robber barons don't even want to pay the head tax which would cover part of the services the hefty visitors consume and help amortize the facility maintenance costs.

The solid benefits of cruising go to a few traders & attraction owners and the rest of the community gets a mirage. Nothing is wrong with that IF those who benefit also pay for the capital cost of the cruise facility.... they don't. Taxpayers do.

The average cruiser spends maybe 15% of a stop over guest and consumes services the destination has to pay for. .. Hoteliers complain all the while of the subsidies cruising get...while producing peanuts.

Cruising is great for the cruise lines ...and a few traders..period. Cruising can work well if vessels home port at the destination and obtain a local supply chain for goods and services. Unfortunately most of those robber baron cruise companies home port in Florida....where 90% of the economic spin offs remain

Now some stupid JLPNP politicians decide to borrow hundreds of millions of US$ to build something in the hope that overweight Americans will get off the gaudy boat and spend money... guess what?? They generally don't....and when they do the money mainly goes to a few who dun rich already and get richer because taxpayers enable the folly.

This scenario was obvious to me from the beginning... mi nuh need fi si nuh guy analysis

[Willi]

Dont generalize. This is a PJ thing. Maxwell fought it tooth and nail.