Wonder of the Seas in Palma, Mallorca

Wonder of the Seas in Palma last Tuesday. | Jaume Morey

Majorca Daily Bulletin reporterPalma09/05/2022 10:50
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With the Royal Caribbean Wonder of the Seas stopping over in Palma on Monday, the Palma XXI association and the Platform Against Mega-Cruise Ships are restating their opposition to the agreement to limit cruise ships that was formally signed last week.

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The agreement between the Balearic government and cruise operators is for no more than three cruise ships per day, one of which can be a ship of 5,000 passengers. The platform, which has been arguing for tougher limits for the past three years, insists that three ships are too many for the city to handle. "We don’t want any super-mega-cruise ships in our city. The tourism industry seems to have no limits, no capacity to self-regulate, as it will always find ways to grow and do so in alliance with institutions so as to legitimise itself."

They point to a ship, the Wonder of the Seas, which is 362 metres long, has capacity for 7,000 passengers and 2,300 crew, and twenty dining rooms. "It is a ship that is seven times the height of the Cathedral. It stops for a few hours. There are thousands of people on the streets of downtown Palma. It pollutes almost ten times more than all the cars in Palma put together and generates 2,000 tonnes of waste a day. This is unsustainable tourism, a totally out-of-scale tourism."