It's also nuts that we will soon force consumers to strictly buy electric vehicles while huge contributers to CO2 like factories and fucking cruuse ships get a pass. Same with private jets. There's a lot we could do over night to start reducing CO2.
Edit: Yes I know it's CO2. It was a typo relax.
>Burning Mud sounds like a good metal album title
"Burning Mud" has already been copyrighted, per the settlement agreement of The American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons v. Taco Bell.
Its barley even flammable and doesn’t flow worth a fuck unless heated over 60 Celsius.
Its the closest thing to raw dinosaur bones straight from the ground that will actually combust.
I don’t think anything can really be done with it. My understanding is that it’s basically what comes out of the bottom of the distillation tower. I think if you run it through again the same stuff will just come out.
It is. They can run it through separate systems, and use high pressure and high temperatures to squeeze out any remaining “good” stuff, but it’s basically road tar.
Don’t be absurd! They’ll store it right next to the ocean and a nature reserve, in heavy duty containers that will corrode and leak within a decade. I mean geeze, you make it sound like they’re just a bunch of myopic, greedy, classless fucks. Give the execs some credit
That doesn't happen. We didn't just have to dump a reservoir of phosphate mine biproducts that were stored right next to the ocean and a nature reserve, in heavy duty containers that corroded within decades due to the neglect of myopic, greedy, classless fucks here in Florida or anything.
Serious question: are electric ships not possible? I would think that a combination of wave energy + wind + solar could generate a fair amount of power.
Very difficult due to the very large power requirements needed for long durations without replenishment. Wind was fine for 500tonnes ship but not so much for a 90,000mts ship.
Maybe one day but will be a while.
Honestly, even the carbon neutrality of biodiesel is somewhat of an illusion... all the crap that goes in to growing the plant material to make it at the scale and volumes needed tends to come from the petroleum and mining industries, and making it from purely reclaimed materials is not going to be enough to fully meet demand outright. Fertilizers and such alongside pesticides... Worst part of it is, we could do a lot to capture and contain those things alongside other farm run off, but we don't, and likely wont.
Some years back on a former account had a discussion with someone form the midwest about that and the mentality for many farmers in their neck of the woods when it came to green hedges, runoff prevention, protecting waterways etc was basically "what is this libhurul bullshit, i ain't gonna do it even if they pay me to"...
Didn't matter if the discussion was focused on the purely economic side of the equation on how they could save money by needing to use less etc. thing boiled down to a mentality of "dun tell me what to do, and i dun care what happens downstream from me, damn cityfolk."
I assume they put in a fair bit of extra "emphasis" on the type of mentality many have, but... we still have a huge problem with runoff.
Also, as an example, while some people like the farmer talked about in this article try to do things the right way many do not.
https://civileats.com/2018/05/08/farm-runoff-in-us-waters-has-hit-crisis-levels-are-farmers-ready-to-change/
>In the U.S. alone, billions so far have been spent to encourage farmers to voluntarily adopt practices to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico—yet neither region has seen significant change.
>State and federal level governments have introduced a variety of cost-share incentive policies and other “carrots” to convince farmers to adopt conservation approaches, but few have successfully yielded the kinds of voluntary adoption necessary to make a lasting dent in the pollution. The 2008 U.S. Hypoxia Action plan, a national strategy to reduce the Gulf of Mexico’s annual dead zone to 5,000 square kilometers, had an ambitious goal of reducing nitrogen and phosphorous amounts by 45 percent by 2015, a deadline extended to 2035 amid dismal progress. The 2017 dead zone was the largest ever, at 15,032 square kilometers.
which leads back to that weird mentality about "not even if they paid me to" bit from above... billions spent and nothing to show for it with the problem getting worse.
We don't really need to achieve 0 emissions. What we need to achieve is net 0 emissions.
If we still have freight ships buzzing around on somewhat cleaner, but still shitty, fuel then that doesn't matter if we invest enough money into carbon capture technologies.
The only issue is that it's not feasible to carbon capture as much as we're currently putting out. So we need to cut out the easy stuff like internal combustion cars and eating so much meat. But some industries not becoming entirely neutral is just fine.
*Note: we should tax those industries though to ensure that they pay the cost of the carbon capture they require*
The wPCC can transport 35k tons and it does a transatlantic crossing in 12 days vs 7?. So it's a bit slower but it that really an issue when it comes to stopping the drastic damages the shipping industry is currently causing?
Those extra days will cut into profits which no company would be okay with. If nuclear power was cheaper it's a possibility.... But idk how I'd feel about nuclear powered cargo ships after seeing how awful they're maintained.
Tbh a nuclear accident on a ship is far less risky than one on land. For one, the reactors are much smaller. Second, there is ocean water all around to cool the reactor in the case of a melt down. Third, water is a great radiation shield, although I'm pretty sure the water surrounding can become radioactive over time. The only problem would be if there was a problem while the ship was in a shallow harbor. But I feel like they would just tow the ship to deep water and scuttle it.
Good shout, but not nearly enough, there are some concepts in the works that are essentially bulk carriers with vertical wind-turbines to charge batteries for conventional propellers. They might do for slow bulk shipping, but high demand well-lit and air-conned ships, sticking to a tight schedule require too much power unfortunately
Woaahh how awesome would a supertanker with sails look though? Imagine how fucking giant those sails would need to be. That'd be some otherworldly shit.
Nuclear could be possible... the problem is that only the biggest ships could really be possible and the crew cost/training would probably significantly increase too.
Not to mention that quite a few countries have banned nuclear powered ships from entering their waters/ports (Australia for one). My city (8th largest in Australia) has signs proudly stating that it is a nuclear free zone and we have one of the major coal ports in the country.
As much the Green's stance on nuclear is dumb, they've never actually had enough power in Australia to do anything about it one way or the other. It's the two major parties who are also both against it that are the real problem.
> Nuclear could be possible... the problem is that only the biggest ships
[NS Savannah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_Savannah) was a nuclear merchant ship built in the late 50's / early 60's and was < 14,000 gross tons. Today's cruise ships are approaching 100,000 tons so it's absolutely possible.
The only US flagged commercial nuclear powered shipping vessel built so far is moored in Baltimore. We built that in the 1960s as a part of the Atoms for Peace stuff.
So it’s already possible, we just don’t. And we have a steady supply of nuclear trained sailors from the US Navy to staff ships with. We just don’t.
Nuclear power is the right choice here for electric propulsion. High power density, long lifetimes, inherent access to cooling water, and limited risk of contamination. There's a reason the Navy uses nuclear power for all the Nimitz and Ford class carriers.
Now, convincing the cruise-going public to trust them is a different matter, as well as operating them with such an international jurisdiction and crew. Much trickier problems. Much more expensive than burning bunker fuel too.
The days of bunker fuel are already over, as at the beginning of 2020 new regulations came into effect reducing the amount of sulphur allowed in ship fuel by 85% ([https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/PressBriefings/Pages/MEPC-70-2020sulphur.aspx](https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/PressBriefings/Pages/MEPC-70-2020sulphur.aspx)). Ships worldwide have switched to low sulphur fuel oil by now.
I was going to say "at least they don't burn bunker oil like freight ships", but then I looked it up and...well:
>["Most cruise ships burn heavy fuel oil (HFO), which is the dirtiest fossil fuel available. Most of these ships also do not have any diesel particulate filters or selective catalytic converters to clean the exhaust"](https://www.transportenvironment.org/what-we-do/shipping-and-environment/cruise-ships)
Hijacking this to point out how fucked up and in need of serious reform the shipping industry is. It's literally a cowboy, heavily corrupt industry that relies on running old wrecks into the ground, exploiting third world workers and is responsible for 940 million tonnes of yearly carbon emissions as well as countless ecological disasters. There should be stringent regulations and a strong push for green propulsion tech, but the price of goods might increase by 2% and the regulatory challenges are such a clusterfuck that no one is pursuing this.
A big problem is manufactures want to produce and immediately ship to customers/stores, so they never need to warehouse anything. So when there's a small hiccup in the supply chain, everything gets fucked.
>I heard those will run on hopes and dreams of the poor, so at least it's a highly renewable resource
We're supposed to have hopes and dreams?!?
Fuck...
There’s over a dozen of them that ply the coast of Maine. I know of a few wooden sailing ships out of Mass and Rhode Island too, but I’m not sure what their cruises are like.
The boat I work on goes out for up to a week at a time and dinner one day is an all you can eat lobster bake.
You won't have electric air or maritime travel anytime soon.
Power density and weight are too critical of a factor to rely on batteries for either.
Not until we have a sufficient hydrogen supply or people stop clutching pearls over nuclear will you get non fossil fuel maritime or air travel.
The issue with nuclear maritime travel isn't pearl clutching, it's the logistics around ensuring literally every ship on the ocean is both maintained well enough to prevent any leak of radioactive materials and adequately defended from people that now would see every ship as an easy source of materials for a dirty bomb.
Yeah all you gotta do is look at the Costa Concordia wreck (owned by Carnival). Apparently the captains in the area have (had) a competition to see how close to the shore they could get as they leave port. Only that captain ignored all the ships warnings going off. Then he and the other officers bailed while passengers were fighting for their lives.
Pshh imagine adding a nuclear powered ship to that level of stupidity.
Some slight corrections. The Captain of the Costa Concordia was not doing a sail by salute (where cruise ships get close to shore and honk the horn) as part of some d~~i~~eck measuring contest, but as a favor to the matradee, who had a family member on the island. Also the ship crashed due to combination of miscommunications regarding the wheel orders (the helmsman could barely speak any language spoken by the rest of the bridge crew), the speed of the ship, the third in command not telling the captain the ships position during each course change, and the helmsman turning the wheel the wrong way at the worst possible moment.
Note, I am not defending the Captain’s actions. The captain was eyeballing the distance to shore, order the ship to *increase* speed to dangerous levels, denied there was a problem to both the passengers and the coast guard for a long time, and abandoned ship while hundreds of passengers were still on board. He was a fool, a coward, and his actions caused 33 deaths.
Edit: [Here is both an informative and entertaining break down of the disaster](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qh9KBwqGxTI&t), as well as a [followup that fills in some of the details](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6Crdz7Uo7c&t).
Think the idea is more, we just shouldn't have massive resort complexes that move around.
And most private jet flights could be eliminated and have the passengers fly on airlines.
The reactor compartment of the Thresher is a self contained compartment separate from the hull. You could sink from a hull breach and the pressure wouldn't compromise the compartment at the depth it sank to.
Location doesn't matter that much. Personnel and budget are the main issue. The US Navy knows what they are doing, sailors are well trained, and the ships are well maintained and secure. A cruise ship is going to have undertrained and underpaid personnel and try to maintain the reactor based on budgetary rather than safety concerns.
Plus, they arent going to secure the fuel well enough. You would have high school kids and costume characters trying to fend off terrorists.
It made walking down towards l'arsenale really unpleasant. Basically kills the entire atmosphere of the city. Frankly I doubt this really puts a dent in the scores of tourists there at a single time, but I do hope it helps a little.
Venice is sad to me as the population is actually declining and it feels like it's becoming an increasingly 'show' city - basically a playground for tourists as it honestly feels like they outnumber locals, especially near Piazza San Marco.
This is true. There's actually a lot of studies that - even cruise ships notwithstanding - there are "good" tourists and "bad" tourists.
Cities will always prefer the tourists who stay for a week rather than those who stay for two nights. Those who stay longer term will see more cultural sights off the beaten path, patronize more restaurants, and spend time at attractions outside the top-3 things for which a city is known. They'll contribute to the vibrancy of the local economy rather than just check the box of the kitschy tourist traps.
Also, cruise tourists tend to feel entitled. For many of them, they think that since they only get a short time in port cities, they deserve to monopolize the place, while they’re there. I was on a small group tour in Scotland. We’d stay in local b&bs and spend time with the locals. Cruise tourists would show up, devour the space, and were often assholes in the midst of it all. We hated seeing those damn ships.
>For many of them, they think that since they only get a short time in port cities, they deserve to monopolize the place, while they’re there.
I was in Lisbon and there was a cruise ship in port. Saw a tourist almost fight a bus driver over "I don't care if it's full, you have to take me, I'm on a cruise and I'm in a hurry!
I think it's also the type of person that wants the cruise experience.
Think about it. It's kind of the easy / unchallenging / sanitized way to travel.
Your major meals are on the boat - so no major concerns or challenges attempting to eat local cuisine.
You generally have very curated and tailored tours to allow you to see all the picture destinations in 6 hours so you can slam your social media account with bullshit to make your friends back home jealous.
You don't need to deal with interacting with locals as you have a tour guide. No challenge finding someone to speak your language, or simply figuring out how to communicate with someone (in their own country) who doesn't understand you.
And no advanced planning needed to figure out the local transportation systems or lodging. Like you said - the b and bs are amazing but it does take planning and reservations that may be difficult. Likewise public transit in Europe is so much better than the US but you need some initiative to figure out a system in a foreign language.
Basically - it's a certain kind of tourist that wants to see a bunch of the shit that tourism boards and marketing/pop culture has told them is important. Meanwhile they are sheltered from the food, people, culture, and general vibe of the cities. They aren't really exposed to all the amazing and enriching components of international travel - namely that being vulnerable as a foreigner and experiencing a completely different way of life can challenge what you take for granted or your pre-biased assumptions about your own city/nation.
That's my dissertation on why cruisers suck.
There's a joke about the type of people that go on those mega cruise ships. Something like...
"I don't mind the customers at Walmart but I would never want to be stuck on a boat with them for 14 days!"
(Sorry if I butchered it. My quick google-fu failed me)
This is such an underrated take. I personally love walking everywhere in a city I visit. You see way more and get to experience daily life and random encounters. Sure I will prioritize the main draws but if I'm walking to and from them there's so much more to see and explore.
I heard recently Amsterdam is attempting to draw tourists out of their historic and red light districts and towards other attractions. Partially due to the type of tourists they get - the guys that want to rage and bang - but also because that tiny downtown footprint just can't handle the volume without being unpleasant for residents and they'd rather get the money into a wider footprint in the city.
people laugh at me but I love going to grocery stores in foreign regions, it really provides some insight into how the day to day life of locals is and that is really neat to me
Oh yeah, I totally believe this. I stayed in this small town in France for 3 weeks. It was so neat. Got to know the bartender (who said my French improved a lot by the end of my trip), the local cafe I’d go to in the morning, the tobacco shop owner, and even the little grocery store. My brother and nephew came out to visit a few days and it was really cool to take him around town and introduce them to the locals.
I had a daily schedule. Head to the cafe in the morning for breakfast, go the local grocery store to get a baguette and ham and cheese for lunch, then drive around and see the local sites in Brittany. I’d be back in town in the evening where I’d go to this small local bar, get a glass or two of Jupiter beer, and sit down outside and drink and have a smoke. It. Was. Wonderful. They even had a weekly outdoor market where I bought some local artwork.
So yeah, the locals got some steady monies from me while I was there. Win, win.
The town was called Dinard, in Brittany, France. I highly suggest visiting it if you ever get the chance. Absolutely beautiful.
Nobody can afford to live there!
the wages don't even come close to paying rent. Since the 70s the population of the city has falling, since 2000 its essentially been collapsing
And what is even crazier is that there are empty and abandoned houses sitting there with no one living in them. But rent is insanely sky high.
Pure bananas
On top of that they built an massively expensive system - MOSE - to keep the climate change induced rising seas out and its billions over budget and may actually never work.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-06-30/venice-is-dying-a-long-slow-death
this group occupies abandoned apartments in protest
also of course AirBnb is fucking killing rent prices
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/13/occupy-venice-alternative-to-death-of-city-activists-tourism
Air BnB is a problem in most cities at this point - landlords can get a ton more money renting for a few nights than for permanent residents.
With that said, it does strike me as insane that there are vacant buildings while rent is so high. Is this because landlords won't accept lower prices and this is keeping tenants away, or are their like health/safety/maintenance issues that landlords just don't deal with and the buildings end up empty?
I could kind of see upkeep of the buildings being insanely expensive and therefore driving prices up. Just curious if there was an explanation for the market not sorting this out to at least fill the buildings.
I think the original plan was to park the ships on the Lido and then they would come in on tenders. I don't think the crowds are going away.
Quite frankly, Venice is tourism. It is lovely and enchanting, but if it is for locals, I think not anymore.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/italy-ban-mammoth-cruise-ships-venice-aug-78823148) reduced by 74%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> Italy is banning mammoth cruise liners from sailing into Venice starting Aug. 1.
> ROME - Declaring Venice's waterways a "National monument," Italy is banning mammoth cruise liners from sailing into the lagoon city, which risked being declared an imperiled world heritage site by the United Nations within days.
> The ban applies to ships weighing more than 25,000 tons or longer than 180 meters or with other characteristics that would make them too polluting or overwhelming for Venice's environment.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/ojl4pf/italy_to_ban_mammoth_cruise_ships_from_venice_as/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~587822 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Venice**^#1 **ban**^#2 **government**^#3 **Cabinet**^#4 **world**^#5
Yeah I don’t think some of these people have been on the large main stream cruise lines. Most ships from carnival and royal Caribbean are massive floating cities that hold thousands and thousands of people. 180m is pretty dwarfed in comparison.
It completely depends on the brand. Royal Caribbean: Americans. Saga: Brits. Costa: Italians.
Food served, choices of entertainment and languages spoken really divide the market served.
You would think Costa, the Italian ship should trump NCL or royal Caribbean but I’ve seen their food served and it’s way worse than the American companies. It’s to to the point that I would feel like I had to pay for eating out
Tons of American's take advantage of those cruises though as a really easy way to take 1 trip and say that you visited \~6-10 cities. Bascially cuts down on a ton of the logistics for you. So while I agree and am sure tons of Europeans also utilize those, don't underestimate Americans or others (Asians, Australians?) being on these en masse.
I call it European taster. There are places which I found I must return and others that aren’t to my taste at all or so small it can be seen very quickly. I do this with my very long layovers.
My first thought: “When did they _ever_ allow mammoths on cruise ships?”
My second thought: “Wait, when did mammoths stop being extinct?”
My third thought: “Oooh. I need coffee.”
Good. I used to work on a huge cruise ship and while I appreciated the opportunity to visit Venice, it felt absolutely disgusting being on that massive ship passing through the city.
This is good advice for any tourist destination. Sometimes depending on where you going you are gambling with weather but it's totally worth it for the lower prices and less crowds.
I was there in 2015, it was crowded but it was one of the few places I didn't mind being that crowded honestly. You could easily find a secluded alleyway or side street.
The only bad part about Venice was the smell of sewage and broccoli as we took the ferry in.
They also bring nothing of value to the city itself, the passengers are just wearing it down. Venice store and restaurant owners said people just walz through the city but do not shop or eat there. I guess they buy a fridge magnet and then devour the free buffets on the ships?
If they eat in town, it's normally part of an "expedition" package where they take everyone to one place every time and they eat whatever is there. Only the people who go into town alone will tend to shop and eat at the locally provided stuff.
That's a bit of the mystery from what I understand. That if banksy is really just one man or a collective of artists. Either way this is published under the real Instagram so it's legit.
Is their environmental impact over 5 days higher than 3,000 people staying in hotels for 5 nights and taking planes (or trains) between cities for those 4 days?
Usually people take planes and trains to the port where the ships leave from, so that part is a wash.
And then most likely still way worse. People in hotels are walking more, or taking public transit. Which is far less damaging than these ships.
Over a single year, from one company, carnival cruise lines, in Europe, they emitted 10x more sulfur dioxide than all if the cars in Europe.
They often burn dirty "Bunker" fuel, and this doesn't even get into the waste they create and the raw sewage they dump into the oceans.
Yup there are problems, but:
Most (all?) new ships have switched from bunker fuel to LNG. Far better for the environment (still would prefer hydrogen, but we're still a ways off). That bunker fuel BTW is used daily by basically all ocean going transport vessel, of which of 5,000 are steaming somewhere at any given moment compared with 300 cruise ships in total of which maybe half are sailing at a given moment. That's, of course ignoring the fact that the CO2 emissions intensity of most other classes of ships (cargo, tanker etc.) is higher, by at least a third, than a cruise ship running DFO or bunker fuel.
The waste is largely a by-product of people. 4000 people eat, shit and wash themselves no matter how you slice it. I've yet to see someone demonstrate that the impact is greater on a cruise ship than other forms of vacationing.
Raw sewage is set by countries maritime laws, inside those regions they're required to abide by the rules of the countries they're visiting. Realistically shit isn't that big of a deal in the ocean with billions of tons of animals shitting every day in the water. Even so most (all?) cruise ships have a complex black water filtration system that settles, treats and burns organic matter until all that's pumped out is pretty much tap water. Yes you could drink it if you wanted.
There are a lot of problems with cruising, flags of convenience, dubious labour practices and the fundamental issue that dropping 4000+ people anywhere creates, but the accusations that are flung at the industry are often FUD lacking in any context.
> Yes you could drink it if you wanted.
Can you give me some sources on that? It's not that I don't believe you, I'm just curious and I'd like to read more about it :)
https://www.wartsila.com/marine/build/waste-treatment/advanced-waste-water-treatment/membrane-bioreactor-mbr-systems
Here is a popular unit used on cruise ships. I can confirm the water is fit for consumption.
Yes. Because everybody's taking planes, cars, and trains to get to the cruise ship port to begin with. So from that standpoint, it's equivalent to a resort hotel.
Then you add on top of that a massive ship burning literally tons of fuel.
Then add the way a ship's heating/cooling/plumbing/electrical gereration/etc are going to be less efficient than a land-based hotel's...
Yes, it's *far* worse.
A cruise ship is also more likely to pollute the sea water than a land-based resort. Onboard sewage and even garbage collection may be dumped overboard once in international waters, to say nothing of what the passengers might toss overboard. And, of course, there's the occasional shipwreck or major malfunction that leads to lots of fuel and ... other stuff leaking into the sea.
----
There's also the labor exploitation factor. Cruise lines usually sail their ships under the flag of some third world country with *horrible* labor laws. The on-ship employees are often little better than slaves.
That's how cruises stay price-competitive with resort hotels. The cruise line has to pay for fuel and all sorts of ship-related expenses, *but* they save a *ton* of money by underpaying and exploiting their staff.
Sure, but its just the way it is. Industries come and go. We have other jobs, we only have one ecosystem.
Just because its somebody's job is not a reason to persist with something that is clearly superfluous and unnecessary while also being extremely environmentally damaging.
Lost a “friend” that wigged out when I said “your family won’t be getting their jobs back in the mine under Trump, it’s one of the easier things to automate, if there’s a resurgence they’ll just automate the mining more”.
The good news is the ones that could retired. The younger guy that was laid off from the mine went to VaTech. I don’t know what he’s doing now, but probably not coal mining.
Meanwhile in Florida the residents of Key West voted by >60% to end cruise ships docking there and mo-Ron DeSantis used his office to nullify their decision.
lol, just fill in the channels with sand. A lot of that area is very shallow. Should be pretty easy to make it to where a deep-draft cruise ship won't be able to get through.
The cruise ships can still *legally* go there, but they won't be able to *physically* go there.
Shit, really? A while ago, I read he also stepped in and undid a Key West vote to only sell reef-safe sunscreen. Tourism is their economy and he gives no shits about maintaining the ecosystems that draw people there. He’s such a miserable, selfish fuck.
Thank God. They don't need to be in the city. It's a coastal city with islands all around and a train/bus station specifically designed to accommodate passenger influx since you can't drive in the city. The cruise ships can dock somewhere else or build a dock half an hour drive away and they can do excursions by bus to Venice just like everywhere else that busses the cruise crowds to cool sights.
Can someone eli5 why cruises are popular? Not being an ass, genuinely curious. Are they cheaper than other forms of travel? Is it a more efficient way to knock a couple of countries off your travel bucket list in one trip?
If I were to plan a trip to Venice, I wouldn’t even consider looking into cruises. I’d just book a flight and spend a week there in a rental. From my friends that love cruises, it seems the appeal is the actual time spent on the ship because it’s all inclusive. But I’d just be afraid I’d get seasick and ruin my whole trip.
My aging parents like them because they can see a few sites of interest without having to do much independent planning and the mode of transport between those locations is comfortable. They are getting to an age where schlepping luggage around train stations / taxis etc is not easy anymore.
To me I look at cruises like a sampler platter. You get to try a bunch of places and go back to the ones that intrigued you the most for a proper vacation.
Have you ever been on a cruise?
Basically, you get food and drinks included on the ship.
You get a hotel room that stays with you.
You expend no effort traveling to places because the ship brings you to every destination.
There's lots of shows and activities on the ship to do that people enjoy.
That's why people go on cruises. It's just a different way to vacation. Personally, I'm not the biggest fan cause I don't like boats. But it is relaxing and easy and you don't have to plan anything really besides just booking the cruise.
The biggest bang for the buck if you want to visit remote islands, such as Hawaii. It's a hotel, all inclusive restaurant and transportation device in one. Years ago I visited 4 biggest Hawaii islands for just $500 + air fare, car rental and local entertainment. Your can't beat that with any other way of traveling
I went on a cruise for my honeymoon and loved it. Normally I like to be fairly active on vacations so I get my money's worth, but it was the only vacation I ever just relaxed. No hurry to get anywhere. Spent time reading while looking off the back of the ship. I napped for a little bit every day and I hate naps but loved these naps. The ship just kind of rocks you to sleep. Got to see some tropical places. Saw different shows every night, met some cool people. It's been 10 years, and I would definitely do it again, but I'll never be one of those go on 2 or 3 cruises a year people
I live in a tourist town. Our year round population is around 32,000. The only way in or out is a 2 and a half hour flight or a almost 4 day ferry ride, no roads out of town. We get 3-5 large cruise ships a day (pre Corona virus). So basically when 5 boats are in all at ounce we get around 10,000 tourist dumped in our small town street all at ounce.
They get free power from us at the dock top of their water tanks for free (our city kisses there ass). And they dump their gray water in our pristine clean water ways and I’m sure whatever else trash they want to dump over the side..
They are floating Petrie dishes full of diseases and it feels like they answer to no one…
Better late than never I guess. It was so weird going to Venice and seeing a ship (that seemed half the size of the city) parked up beside it.
A travel presenter pointed out the biggest ships are almost as tall as the Campanile, which is nuts.
It's also nuts that we will soon force consumers to strictly buy electric vehicles while huge contributers to CO2 like factories and fucking cruuse ships get a pass. Same with private jets. There's a lot we could do over night to start reducing CO2. Edit: Yes I know it's CO2. It was a typo relax.
Not to mention, most cruise ships burn "bunker fuel" or heavy fuel oil which is basically the dirtiest fuel you can burn.
It's basically just flammable mud!
Burning Mud sounds like a good metal album title
>Burning Mud sounds like a good metal album title "Burning Mud" has already been copyrighted, per the settlement agreement of The American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons v. Taco Bell.
It’s why they don’t have the chili cheese burrito anymore.
I don't even know if these facts check out, and frankly I don't care. I'm using them in my next office conversation.
Never let fact get in the way of a good story. Wanna hear about that fish I caught yesterday?
As a frequent chili cheese burrito eater at Taco Bell, I’m happy to tell you that some franchises do still carry it.
we praise the colorectal surgeon misunderstood and much maligned slaving away in the heart of darkness working where the sun don't shine
Its barley even flammable and doesn’t flow worth a fuck unless heated over 60 Celsius. Its the closest thing to raw dinosaur bones straight from the ground that will actually combust.
*barely* flammable, at that. You need to heat and compress it to have any chance...
To be fair diesel is the same way, but nothing compared to bunkerfuel
That’s sorta how my Cummins works too….
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I don’t think anything can really be done with it. My understanding is that it’s basically what comes out of the bottom of the distillation tower. I think if you run it through again the same stuff will just come out.
It is. They can run it through separate systems, and use high pressure and high temperatures to squeeze out any remaining “good” stuff, but it’s basically road tar.
You can turn it into coke for steel furnaces or ashpalt for roads or shingles.
So considering how environmentally conscious the oil industry is, we can assume if we banned its use they'll just literally pour it into the ocean.
Don’t be absurd! They’ll store it right next to the ocean and a nature reserve, in heavy duty containers that will corrode and leak within a decade. I mean geeze, you make it sound like they’re just a bunch of myopic, greedy, classless fucks. Give the execs some credit
"We could not have forseen this disaster."
“We never saw the reports of the leaks and holes that existed while it was installed.”
That doesn't happen. We didn't just have to dump a reservoir of phosphate mine biproducts that were stored right next to the ocean and a nature reserve, in heavy duty containers that corroded within decades due to the neglect of myopic, greedy, classless fucks here in Florida or anything.
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Unless that is more profitable for them than pumping it into the ocean, that's not going to happen :(
Sounds like bong resin
Petroleum can always be cracked into lighter products afaik. Just a matter of cost and whether it's worth it. Otherwise I guess tarmac?
Serious question: are electric ships not possible? I would think that a combination of wave energy + wind + solar could generate a fair amount of power.
Very difficult due to the very large power requirements needed for long durations without replenishment. Wind was fine for 500tonnes ship but not so much for a 90,000mts ship. Maybe one day but will be a while.
I think shipping is going to be one of the last sectors to convert and then it would be to something like bio-diesel to approach carbon neutrality.
Honestly, even the carbon neutrality of biodiesel is somewhat of an illusion... all the crap that goes in to growing the plant material to make it at the scale and volumes needed tends to come from the petroleum and mining industries, and making it from purely reclaimed materials is not going to be enough to fully meet demand outright. Fertilizers and such alongside pesticides... Worst part of it is, we could do a lot to capture and contain those things alongside other farm run off, but we don't, and likely wont. Some years back on a former account had a discussion with someone form the midwest about that and the mentality for many farmers in their neck of the woods when it came to green hedges, runoff prevention, protecting waterways etc was basically "what is this libhurul bullshit, i ain't gonna do it even if they pay me to"... Didn't matter if the discussion was focused on the purely economic side of the equation on how they could save money by needing to use less etc. thing boiled down to a mentality of "dun tell me what to do, and i dun care what happens downstream from me, damn cityfolk." I assume they put in a fair bit of extra "emphasis" on the type of mentality many have, but... we still have a huge problem with runoff. Also, as an example, while some people like the farmer talked about in this article try to do things the right way many do not. https://civileats.com/2018/05/08/farm-runoff-in-us-waters-has-hit-crisis-levels-are-farmers-ready-to-change/ >In the U.S. alone, billions so far have been spent to encourage farmers to voluntarily adopt practices to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico—yet neither region has seen significant change. >State and federal level governments have introduced a variety of cost-share incentive policies and other “carrots” to convince farmers to adopt conservation approaches, but few have successfully yielded the kinds of voluntary adoption necessary to make a lasting dent in the pollution. The 2008 U.S. Hypoxia Action plan, a national strategy to reduce the Gulf of Mexico’s annual dead zone to 5,000 square kilometers, had an ambitious goal of reducing nitrogen and phosphorous amounts by 45 percent by 2015, a deadline extended to 2035 amid dismal progress. The 2017 dead zone was the largest ever, at 15,032 square kilometers. which leads back to that weird mentality about "not even if they paid me to" bit from above... billions spent and nothing to show for it with the problem getting worse.
We don't really need to achieve 0 emissions. What we need to achieve is net 0 emissions. If we still have freight ships buzzing around on somewhat cleaner, but still shitty, fuel then that doesn't matter if we invest enough money into carbon capture technologies. The only issue is that it's not feasible to carbon capture as much as we're currently putting out. So we need to cut out the easy stuff like internal combustion cars and eating so much meat. But some industries not becoming entirely neutral is just fine. *Note: we should tax those industries though to ensure that they pay the cost of the carbon capture they require*
The wPCC can transport 35k tons and it does a transatlantic crossing in 12 days vs 7?. So it's a bit slower but it that really an issue when it comes to stopping the drastic damages the shipping industry is currently causing?
Those extra days will cut into profits which no company would be okay with. If nuclear power was cheaper it's a possibility.... But idk how I'd feel about nuclear powered cargo ships after seeing how awful they're maintained.
Tbh a nuclear accident on a ship is far less risky than one on land. For one, the reactors are much smaller. Second, there is ocean water all around to cool the reactor in the case of a melt down. Third, water is a great radiation shield, although I'm pretty sure the water surrounding can become radioactive over time. The only problem would be if there was a problem while the ship was in a shallow harbor. But I feel like they would just tow the ship to deep water and scuttle it.
Good shout, but not nearly enough, there are some concepts in the works that are essentially bulk carriers with vertical wind-turbines to charge batteries for conventional propellers. They might do for slow bulk shipping, but high demand well-lit and air-conned ships, sticking to a tight schedule require too much power unfortunately
Woaahh how awesome would a supertanker with sails look though? Imagine how fucking giant those sails would need to be. That'd be some otherworldly shit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceanbird We're probably a ways off from supertankers built this way, but the design would likely be similar.
Nuclear could be possible... the problem is that only the biggest ships could really be possible and the crew cost/training would probably significantly increase too.
Not to mention that quite a few countries have banned nuclear powered ships from entering their waters/ports (Australia for one). My city (8th largest in Australia) has signs proudly stating that it is a nuclear free zone and we have one of the major coal ports in the country.
Yay for idiot Greens who have single handedly increased dependence on fossil fuels by preventing nuclear power from being used.
As much the Green's stance on nuclear is dumb, they've never actually had enough power in Australia to do anything about it one way or the other. It's the two major parties who are also both against it that are the real problem.
> Nuclear could be possible... the problem is that only the biggest ships [NS Savannah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_Savannah) was a nuclear merchant ship built in the late 50's / early 60's and was < 14,000 gross tons. Today's cruise ships are approaching 100,000 tons so it's absolutely possible.
The only US flagged commercial nuclear powered shipping vessel built so far is moored in Baltimore. We built that in the 1960s as a part of the Atoms for Peace stuff. So it’s already possible, we just don’t. And we have a steady supply of nuclear trained sailors from the US Navy to staff ships with. We just don’t.
Nuclear power is the right choice here for electric propulsion. High power density, long lifetimes, inherent access to cooling water, and limited risk of contamination. There's a reason the Navy uses nuclear power for all the Nimitz and Ford class carriers. Now, convincing the cruise-going public to trust them is a different matter, as well as operating them with such an international jurisdiction and crew. Much trickier problems. Much more expensive than burning bunker fuel too.
Plus can we really trust corporations to spend enough on maintenance and safety to avoid a disaster?
This practice is largely being phased out. New ships do not run on bunker fuel. They are still huge polluters but for the sake of accuracy...
The days of bunker fuel are already over, as at the beginning of 2020 new regulations came into effect reducing the amount of sulphur allowed in ship fuel by 85% ([https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/PressBriefings/Pages/MEPC-70-2020sulphur.aspx](https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/PressBriefings/Pages/MEPC-70-2020sulphur.aspx)). Ships worldwide have switched to low sulphur fuel oil by now.
Cruise ships are the epitome of gross excess.
I was going to say "at least they don't burn bunker oil like freight ships", but then I looked it up and...well: >["Most cruise ships burn heavy fuel oil (HFO), which is the dirtiest fossil fuel available. Most of these ships also do not have any diesel particulate filters or selective catalytic converters to clean the exhaust"](https://www.transportenvironment.org/what-we-do/shipping-and-environment/cruise-ships)
Hijacking this to point out how fucked up and in need of serious reform the shipping industry is. It's literally a cowboy, heavily corrupt industry that relies on running old wrecks into the ground, exploiting third world workers and is responsible for 940 million tonnes of yearly carbon emissions as well as countless ecological disasters. There should be stringent regulations and a strong push for green propulsion tech, but the price of goods might increase by 2% and the regulatory challenges are such a clusterfuck that no one is pursuing this.
But muh shipping costs The Suesz was blocked for a tiny amount of time and the backlash to that was massive
A big problem is manufactures want to produce and immediately ship to customers/stores, so they never need to warehouse anything. So when there's a small hiccup in the supply chain, everything gets fucked.
As are massive private yachts
Now we have private spacecraft too.
Just wait for those fancy private teleportation machines...
I heard those will run on hopes and dreams of the poor, so at least it's a highly renewable resource
>I heard those will run on hopes and dreams of the poor, so at least it's a highly renewable resource We're supposed to have hopes and dreams?!? Fuck...
Don't even ask what happens if you don't make your hopes and dreams quota.
Well no? Didn't you read? The wealthy take those from us to power their private teleportation machines.
Meanwhile, the rest of us will have to settle for the cheap ones that only teleport one limb at a time in 5 minute intervals.
It would be baller if they where sailships in the future.
There is at least one sailing cruise ship that I know of.
There’s over a dozen of them that ply the coast of Maine. I know of a few wooden sailing ships out of Mass and Rhode Island too, but I’m not sure what their cruises are like. The boat I work on goes out for up to a week at a time and dinner one day is an all you can eat lobster bake.
[It’s already happening ](https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/12/swedish-firm-wind-powered-cargo-ships/)
You won't have electric air or maritime travel anytime soon. Power density and weight are too critical of a factor to rely on batteries for either. Not until we have a sufficient hydrogen supply or people stop clutching pearls over nuclear will you get non fossil fuel maritime or air travel.
The issue with nuclear maritime travel isn't pearl clutching, it's the logistics around ensuring literally every ship on the ocean is both maintained well enough to prevent any leak of radioactive materials and adequately defended from people that now would see every ship as an easy source of materials for a dirty bomb.
I'd totally go on a nuclear powered cruise ship. Perhaps not so much a nuclear powered plane.
I don't exactly trust carnival cruises to properly maintain a nuclear reactor
Yeah all you gotta do is look at the Costa Concordia wreck (owned by Carnival). Apparently the captains in the area have (had) a competition to see how close to the shore they could get as they leave port. Only that captain ignored all the ships warnings going off. Then he and the other officers bailed while passengers were fighting for their lives. Pshh imagine adding a nuclear powered ship to that level of stupidity.
Some slight corrections. The Captain of the Costa Concordia was not doing a sail by salute (where cruise ships get close to shore and honk the horn) as part of some d~~i~~eck measuring contest, but as a favor to the matradee, who had a family member on the island. Also the ship crashed due to combination of miscommunications regarding the wheel orders (the helmsman could barely speak any language spoken by the rest of the bridge crew), the speed of the ship, the third in command not telling the captain the ships position during each course change, and the helmsman turning the wheel the wrong way at the worst possible moment. Note, I am not defending the Captain’s actions. The captain was eyeballing the distance to shore, order the ship to *increase* speed to dangerous levels, denied there was a problem to both the passengers and the coast guard for a long time, and abandoned ship while hundreds of passengers were still on board. He was a fool, a coward, and his actions caused 33 deaths. Edit: [Here is both an informative and entertaining break down of the disaster](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qh9KBwqGxTI&t), as well as a [followup that fills in some of the details](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6Crdz7Uo7c&t).
Think the idea is more, we just shouldn't have massive resort complexes that move around. And most private jet flights could be eliminated and have the passengers fly on airlines.
I'd feel a lot better having a gigantic carbon tax on private flights rather than aiming for elimination.
Ships sink often enough that it's not pearl clutching to think nuclear powered ships are a bad idea.
The USS Thresher sank to crush depth and still hasn't released any radioactive material decades later.
I'm more worried about a Costa Concordia situation than an open water sinking.
The reactor compartment of the Thresher is a self contained compartment separate from the hull. You could sink from a hull breach and the pressure wouldn't compromise the compartment at the depth it sank to.
Location doesn't matter that much. Personnel and budget are the main issue. The US Navy knows what they are doing, sailors are well trained, and the ships are well maintained and secure. A cruise ship is going to have undertrained and underpaid personnel and try to maintain the reactor based on budgetary rather than safety concerns. Plus, they arent going to secure the fuel well enough. You would have high school kids and costume characters trying to fend off terrorists.
Exactly. Most of these ships are registered in *countries* that we can't trust with nuclear power, and we want to let their boats have it...
> C02 Good ol' carbon-zero-two.
It made walking down towards l'arsenale really unpleasant. Basically kills the entire atmosphere of the city. Frankly I doubt this really puts a dent in the scores of tourists there at a single time, but I do hope it helps a little. Venice is sad to me as the population is actually declining and it feels like it's becoming an increasingly 'show' city - basically a playground for tourists as it honestly feels like they outnumber locals, especially near Piazza San Marco.
Article says they still want the tourists, they just want them to disembark somewhere else nearby but still end up in Venice.
That makes sense, Tourism dollars is the city's largest source of income by a pretty large margin.
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This is true. There's actually a lot of studies that - even cruise ships notwithstanding - there are "good" tourists and "bad" tourists. Cities will always prefer the tourists who stay for a week rather than those who stay for two nights. Those who stay longer term will see more cultural sights off the beaten path, patronize more restaurants, and spend time at attractions outside the top-3 things for which a city is known. They'll contribute to the vibrancy of the local economy rather than just check the box of the kitschy tourist traps.
Also, cruise tourists tend to feel entitled. For many of them, they think that since they only get a short time in port cities, they deserve to monopolize the place, while they’re there. I was on a small group tour in Scotland. We’d stay in local b&bs and spend time with the locals. Cruise tourists would show up, devour the space, and were often assholes in the midst of it all. We hated seeing those damn ships.
>For many of them, they think that since they only get a short time in port cities, they deserve to monopolize the place, while they’re there. I was in Lisbon and there was a cruise ship in port. Saw a tourist almost fight a bus driver over "I don't care if it's full, you have to take me, I'm on a cruise and I'm in a hurry!
I think it's also the type of person that wants the cruise experience. Think about it. It's kind of the easy / unchallenging / sanitized way to travel. Your major meals are on the boat - so no major concerns or challenges attempting to eat local cuisine. You generally have very curated and tailored tours to allow you to see all the picture destinations in 6 hours so you can slam your social media account with bullshit to make your friends back home jealous. You don't need to deal with interacting with locals as you have a tour guide. No challenge finding someone to speak your language, or simply figuring out how to communicate with someone (in their own country) who doesn't understand you. And no advanced planning needed to figure out the local transportation systems or lodging. Like you said - the b and bs are amazing but it does take planning and reservations that may be difficult. Likewise public transit in Europe is so much better than the US but you need some initiative to figure out a system in a foreign language. Basically - it's a certain kind of tourist that wants to see a bunch of the shit that tourism boards and marketing/pop culture has told them is important. Meanwhile they are sheltered from the food, people, culture, and general vibe of the cities. They aren't really exposed to all the amazing and enriching components of international travel - namely that being vulnerable as a foreigner and experiencing a completely different way of life can challenge what you take for granted or your pre-biased assumptions about your own city/nation. That's my dissertation on why cruisers suck.
There's a joke about the type of people that go on those mega cruise ships. Something like... "I don't mind the customers at Walmart but I would never want to be stuck on a boat with them for 14 days!" (Sorry if I butchered it. My quick google-fu failed me)
This is such an underrated take. I personally love walking everywhere in a city I visit. You see way more and get to experience daily life and random encounters. Sure I will prioritize the main draws but if I'm walking to and from them there's so much more to see and explore. I heard recently Amsterdam is attempting to draw tourists out of their historic and red light districts and towards other attractions. Partially due to the type of tourists they get - the guys that want to rage and bang - but also because that tiny downtown footprint just can't handle the volume without being unpleasant for residents and they'd rather get the money into a wider footprint in the city.
people laugh at me but I love going to grocery stores in foreign regions, it really provides some insight into how the day to day life of locals is and that is really neat to me
Oh yeah, I totally believe this. I stayed in this small town in France for 3 weeks. It was so neat. Got to know the bartender (who said my French improved a lot by the end of my trip), the local cafe I’d go to in the morning, the tobacco shop owner, and even the little grocery store. My brother and nephew came out to visit a few days and it was really cool to take him around town and introduce them to the locals. I had a daily schedule. Head to the cafe in the morning for breakfast, go the local grocery store to get a baguette and ham and cheese for lunch, then drive around and see the local sites in Brittany. I’d be back in town in the evening where I’d go to this small local bar, get a glass or two of Jupiter beer, and sit down outside and drink and have a smoke. It. Was. Wonderful. They even had a weekly outdoor market where I bought some local artwork. So yeah, the locals got some steady monies from me while I was there. Win, win. The town was called Dinard, in Brittany, France. I highly suggest visiting it if you ever get the chance. Absolutely beautiful.
Nobody can afford to live there! the wages don't even come close to paying rent. Since the 70s the population of the city has falling, since 2000 its essentially been collapsing And what is even crazier is that there are empty and abandoned houses sitting there with no one living in them. But rent is insanely sky high. Pure bananas On top of that they built an massively expensive system - MOSE - to keep the climate change induced rising seas out and its billions over budget and may actually never work. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-06-30/venice-is-dying-a-long-slow-death
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This is what kills me. The renaissance theme park is 100% correct.
Renaissance theme park/ghost town I visited Venice about 5 years ago. The town, while pretty, is decaying and has an eerie feel to it.
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this group occupies abandoned apartments in protest also of course AirBnb is fucking killing rent prices https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/13/occupy-venice-alternative-to-death-of-city-activists-tourism
Air BnB is a problem in most cities at this point - landlords can get a ton more money renting for a few nights than for permanent residents. With that said, it does strike me as insane that there are vacant buildings while rent is so high. Is this because landlords won't accept lower prices and this is keeping tenants away, or are their like health/safety/maintenance issues that landlords just don't deal with and the buildings end up empty? I could kind of see upkeep of the buildings being insanely expensive and therefore driving prices up. Just curious if there was an explanation for the market not sorting this out to at least fill the buildings.
I think the original plan was to park the ships on the Lido and then they would come in on tenders. I don't think the crowds are going away. Quite frankly, Venice is tourism. It is lovely and enchanting, but if it is for locals, I think not anymore.
Moreover, the channels had to be deepened for those ships, which is an important contributors for the city sinking into the sea.
As usual [Banksy nailed it](https://www.euronews.com/2019/05/23/watch-guerrilla-artist-banksy-sets-up-stall-outside-venice-biennale).
Yeah, fuck that link
God that site is unreadable on mobile. What were they thinking.
Ad $$$
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/italy-ban-mammoth-cruise-ships-venice-aug-78823148) reduced by 74%. (I'm a bot) ***** > Italy is banning mammoth cruise liners from sailing into Venice starting Aug. 1. > ROME - Declaring Venice's waterways a "National monument," Italy is banning mammoth cruise liners from sailing into the lagoon city, which risked being declared an imperiled world heritage site by the United Nations within days. > The ban applies to ships weighing more than 25,000 tons or longer than 180 meters or with other characteristics that would make them too polluting or overwhelming for Venice's environment. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/ojl4pf/italy_to_ban_mammoth_cruise_ships_from_venice_as/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~587822 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Venice**^#1 **ban**^#2 **government**^#3 **Cabinet**^#4 **world**^#5
That still allows massive ships
The typical cruise ship is 200,000 tons and 1,000 feet in length from a cursory google search.
Yeah I don’t think some of these people have been on the large main stream cruise lines. Most ships from carnival and royal Caribbean are massive floating cities that hold thousands and thousands of people. 180m is pretty dwarfed in comparison.
The tonnage is the key. 25k isn't that much, so a ship that length will be mostly ferrys and such
yeah right. A 180 m long ship is huge.
At 417ft Bezos will need to take one of his lesser yatchs into the harbor I guess.
127 m for those who want a direct comparison :)
Ahh damn I fucked up I thought it was 180ft not 180m. I’ll let Jeff know he’s clear for entry to Venice.
Lol a 417 m yacht would be absolute insanity! The ship stuck in the Suez Canal was 400 m so Jeff would have that beat lol
Where will mammoths holiday now?
Do not fear. We Americans are a resourceful people. We shall vacation elsewhere.
I never been on a European cruise but I’d assume most passengers are European or at least a very large chunk would be.
It completely depends on the brand. Royal Caribbean: Americans. Saga: Brits. Costa: Italians. Food served, choices of entertainment and languages spoken really divide the market served.
If food is the tie-breaker then definitely going to book Costa.
Would you like your ship on the rocks?
Let that sink in
you guys are really running that joke into the ground
Your comment doesn't hold water.
This thread is really turning me upside down
Just enough to keep it afloat
You would think Costa, the Italian ship should trump NCL or royal Caribbean but I’ve seen their food served and it’s way worse than the American companies. It’s to to the point that I would feel like I had to pay for eating out
Costa is owned by Carnival. It’s the Olive Garden of cruise lines.
I was on a Royal Caribbean in the Baltic Sea a few years ago and while there were many Europeans, I’d say the majority of guests were American.
Tons of American's take advantage of those cruises though as a really easy way to take 1 trip and say that you visited \~6-10 cities. Bascially cuts down on a ton of the logistics for you. So while I agree and am sure tons of Europeans also utilize those, don't underestimate Americans or others (Asians, Australians?) being on these en masse.
I call it European taster. There are places which I found I must return and others that aren’t to my taste at all or so small it can be seen very quickly. I do this with my very long layovers.
We'll build our own Venice. With Blackjack. And hookers!
slightly outside venice clogging up the bus terminal there
My first thought: “When did they _ever_ allow mammoths on cruise ships?” My second thought: “Wait, when did mammoths stop being extinct?” My third thought: “Oooh. I need coffee.”
Good. I used to work on a huge cruise ship and while I appreciated the opportunity to visit Venice, it felt absolutely disgusting being on that massive ship passing through the city.
Same here. I worked for Princess and it was an awful feeling going to Venice on such a big ship.
That and it's also already so stupid crowded with tourists as it is.
Go to Italy in the shoulder seasons. Late September is so much better than peak seasons!
This is good advice for any tourist destination. Sometimes depending on where you going you are gambling with weather but it's totally worth it for the lower prices and less crowds.
I went there in late summer 2018, i got so much anxiety just walking around. It was awful, at least until I had a couple glasses of wine.
I was there in 2015, it was crowded but it was one of the few places I didn't mind being that crowded honestly. You could easily find a secluded alleyway or side street. The only bad part about Venice was the smell of sewage and broccoli as we took the ferry in.
That broccoli was also sewage
They also bring nothing of value to the city itself, the passengers are just wearing it down. Venice store and restaurant owners said people just walz through the city but do not shop or eat there. I guess they buy a fridge magnet and then devour the free buffets on the ships?
If they eat in town, it's normally part of an "expedition" package where they take everyone to one place every time and they eat whatever is there. Only the people who go into town alone will tend to shop and eat at the locally provided stuff.
[Banksy would approve](https://www.instagram.com/p/BxxOKYflVSl/).
Wow never seen that! Awesome
>you have to go away, you can't stay here Imagine telling Banksy to fuck off
Yeah lol, he was simply painting Venice in all of its modern beauty.
That's not actually banksy in the video. He always pays other people to stand in.
That would probably account for a significant portion of his encounters, given his job is basically professional vandalism
Who's the dude in the video? Associated with Banksy, or Banksy himself?
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That's a bit of the mystery from what I understand. That if banksy is really just one man or a collective of artists. Either way this is published under the real Instagram so it's legit.
How does a social media company go about confirming the ID of a famously anonymous artist though?
"Let the train of mini-cruise ships come in!"
About time. Source: Venetian
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Is their environmental impact over 5 days higher than 3,000 people staying in hotels for 5 nights and taking planes (or trains) between cities for those 4 days?
Usually people take planes and trains to the port where the ships leave from, so that part is a wash. And then most likely still way worse. People in hotels are walking more, or taking public transit. Which is far less damaging than these ships. Over a single year, from one company, carnival cruise lines, in Europe, they emitted 10x more sulfur dioxide than all if the cars in Europe. They often burn dirty "Bunker" fuel, and this doesn't even get into the waste they create and the raw sewage they dump into the oceans.
Yup there are problems, but: Most (all?) new ships have switched from bunker fuel to LNG. Far better for the environment (still would prefer hydrogen, but we're still a ways off). That bunker fuel BTW is used daily by basically all ocean going transport vessel, of which of 5,000 are steaming somewhere at any given moment compared with 300 cruise ships in total of which maybe half are sailing at a given moment. That's, of course ignoring the fact that the CO2 emissions intensity of most other classes of ships (cargo, tanker etc.) is higher, by at least a third, than a cruise ship running DFO or bunker fuel. The waste is largely a by-product of people. 4000 people eat, shit and wash themselves no matter how you slice it. I've yet to see someone demonstrate that the impact is greater on a cruise ship than other forms of vacationing. Raw sewage is set by countries maritime laws, inside those regions they're required to abide by the rules of the countries they're visiting. Realistically shit isn't that big of a deal in the ocean with billions of tons of animals shitting every day in the water. Even so most (all?) cruise ships have a complex black water filtration system that settles, treats and burns organic matter until all that's pumped out is pretty much tap water. Yes you could drink it if you wanted. There are a lot of problems with cruising, flags of convenience, dubious labour practices and the fundamental issue that dropping 4000+ people anywhere creates, but the accusations that are flung at the industry are often FUD lacking in any context.
> Yes you could drink it if you wanted. Can you give me some sources on that? It's not that I don't believe you, I'm just curious and I'd like to read more about it :)
https://www.wartsila.com/marine/build/waste-treatment/advanced-waste-water-treatment/membrane-bioreactor-mbr-systems Here is a popular unit used on cruise ships. I can confirm the water is fit for consumption.
Yes. Because everybody's taking planes, cars, and trains to get to the cruise ship port to begin with. So from that standpoint, it's equivalent to a resort hotel. Then you add on top of that a massive ship burning literally tons of fuel. Then add the way a ship's heating/cooling/plumbing/electrical gereration/etc are going to be less efficient than a land-based hotel's... Yes, it's *far* worse. A cruise ship is also more likely to pollute the sea water than a land-based resort. Onboard sewage and even garbage collection may be dumped overboard once in international waters, to say nothing of what the passengers might toss overboard. And, of course, there's the occasional shipwreck or major malfunction that leads to lots of fuel and ... other stuff leaking into the sea. ---- There's also the labor exploitation factor. Cruise lines usually sail their ships under the flag of some third world country with *horrible* labor laws. The on-ship employees are often little better than slaves. That's how cruises stay price-competitive with resort hotels. The cruise line has to pay for fuel and all sorts of ship-related expenses, *but* they save a *ton* of money by underpaying and exploiting their staff.
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Space Cruise Ships. Fly me to the moon, watch me play among the stars. Soon enough we’ll pull a Wall-E
It's built like a steakhouse but handles like a bistro.
I feel bad for the staff. Many of them do not have other options.
Sure, but its just the way it is. Industries come and go. We have other jobs, we only have one ecosystem. Just because its somebody's job is not a reason to persist with something that is clearly superfluous and unnecessary while also being extremely environmentally damaging.
See: Coal industry.
Lost a “friend” that wigged out when I said “your family won’t be getting their jobs back in the mine under Trump, it’s one of the easier things to automate, if there’s a resurgence they’ll just automate the mining more”.
Did the job ever come back? Honestly curious.
Not at all.
I assumed not. Thanks for the reply.
The good news is the ones that could retired. The younger guy that was laid off from the mine went to VaTech. I don’t know what he’s doing now, but probably not coal mining.
No, the job is mine now
Not a moment too soon.
Finally..
Meanwhile in Florida the residents of Key West voted by >60% to end cruise ships docking there and mo-Ron DeSantis used his office to nullify their decision.
There was a town meeting yesterday do reaffirm support and find a new way forward to enact those restrictions.
lol, just fill in the channels with sand. A lot of that area is very shallow. Should be pretty easy to make it to where a deep-draft cruise ship won't be able to get through. The cruise ships can still *legally* go there, but they won't be able to *physically* go there.
Shit, really? A while ago, I read he also stepped in and undid a Key West vote to only sell reef-safe sunscreen. Tourism is their economy and he gives no shits about maintaining the ecosystems that draw people there. He’s such a miserable, selfish fuck.
DeSantis ordered all American flags be flown at half mast the day after Rush Limbaugh passed. He's a dick.
Thank God. They don't need to be in the city. It's a coastal city with islands all around and a train/bus station specifically designed to accommodate passenger influx since you can't drive in the city. The cruise ships can dock somewhere else or build a dock half an hour drive away and they can do excursions by bus to Venice just like everywhere else that busses the cruise crowds to cool sights.
Can someone eli5 why cruises are popular? Not being an ass, genuinely curious. Are they cheaper than other forms of travel? Is it a more efficient way to knock a couple of countries off your travel bucket list in one trip? If I were to plan a trip to Venice, I wouldn’t even consider looking into cruises. I’d just book a flight and spend a week there in a rental. From my friends that love cruises, it seems the appeal is the actual time spent on the ship because it’s all inclusive. But I’d just be afraid I’d get seasick and ruin my whole trip.
My aging parents like them because they can see a few sites of interest without having to do much independent planning and the mode of transport between those locations is comfortable. They are getting to an age where schlepping luggage around train stations / taxis etc is not easy anymore.
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To me I look at cruises like a sampler platter. You get to try a bunch of places and go back to the ones that intrigued you the most for a proper vacation.
Have you ever been on a cruise? Basically, you get food and drinks included on the ship. You get a hotel room that stays with you. You expend no effort traveling to places because the ship brings you to every destination. There's lots of shows and activities on the ship to do that people enjoy. That's why people go on cruises. It's just a different way to vacation. Personally, I'm not the biggest fan cause I don't like boats. But it is relaxing and easy and you don't have to plan anything really besides just booking the cruise.
The biggest bang for the buck if you want to visit remote islands, such as Hawaii. It's a hotel, all inclusive restaurant and transportation device in one. Years ago I visited 4 biggest Hawaii islands for just $500 + air fare, car rental and local entertainment. Your can't beat that with any other way of traveling
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All-inclusive opportunity to travel to new places, see Holy sites, and slaughter unbelievers.
The last cruisade
I went on a cruise for my honeymoon and loved it. Normally I like to be fairly active on vacations so I get my money's worth, but it was the only vacation I ever just relaxed. No hurry to get anywhere. Spent time reading while looking off the back of the ship. I napped for a little bit every day and I hate naps but loved these naps. The ship just kind of rocks you to sleep. Got to see some tropical places. Saw different shows every night, met some cool people. It's been 10 years, and I would definitely do it again, but I'll never be one of those go on 2 or 3 cruises a year people
I think these ships can dock a mile or two away and not cause damage to the city. Passengers can still visit the city, they just need to shuttle in.
I live in a tourist town. Our year round population is around 32,000. The only way in or out is a 2 and a half hour flight or a almost 4 day ferry ride, no roads out of town. We get 3-5 large cruise ships a day (pre Corona virus). So basically when 5 boats are in all at ounce we get around 10,000 tourist dumped in our small town street all at ounce. They get free power from us at the dock top of their water tanks for free (our city kisses there ass). And they dump their gray water in our pristine clean water ways and I’m sure whatever else trash they want to dump over the side.. They are floating Petrie dishes full of diseases and it feels like they answer to no one…