Avalon was visited by 101 cruise ships in 2024-25, according to the Cruise Ship Annual report for that year. According to the Finance Department director, that’s the lowest number of cruise ships in the last decade/ (That’s not including the Covid shutdowns when there were no cruise ships).
The ships carried a total of 355,457 passengers. The passenger rate has increased. (See below for details.)
The ships generated $1,654,140 in wharfage revenue and $687,49 in Measure H revenue. Measure H funds are to go to the construction of a new hospital, according to the report.
The Avalon City Council on Dec. 16, 2025, received and filed the Cruise Ship Annual Report for fiscal year 2024-25. The vote was 4-0. Councilmember Yesenia De La Rosa.
Mayor Anni Marshall said the cruise ships do more good than harm, apparently referring to the revenue they bring in for the harbor.
“If we didn’t have them, we would have a heck of a time supporting the harbor,” she said.
City Manager David Maistros said with the agreement the council approved that night (with Carnival) and agreements to control the size of the cruise ships, he believed it would be “significantly different” in 2027.
“I’ve been downtown the days just in this last week when there’s no cruise ships and this place is dead and these stores are having to keep their employees on just in case somebody walks in the door. It’s terrible,” Marshall said.
Historically, some members of the Avalon community have seen cruise ship visits as bad for quality of life in the community.
Background
“On September 3, 2024, the City Council adopted Resolution No. 24-34 re-establishing the guidelines for the approval of cruise ships visiting Avalon through December 30, 2027,” wrote Finance Director Matthew Baker in his staff report to the council.
“The guidelines established a framework by which cruise ships would be approved to visit Avalon as a port of call.
According to the guidelines:
- No cruise ships are allowed on the weekends during the summer or on special event weekends without written approval of the city manager or the harbor master.
- Cruise ships are limited to three a week during the off season without written approval of the city manager or the harbor master.
- Visits by ships with 1,000 or fewer passengers will be considered by the harbor master.
“Passenger counts are reported to the Harbor Department upon arrival to the harbor by the cruise operator,” Baker wrote.
“Ship occupancy rates are determined by comparing the reported manifest passengers to the ship’s published passenger capacity, which generally assumes all cabins at double occupancy, and may exceed 100% occupancy as a result of three or more passengers sharing a cabin,” Baker wrote.
“Over the past ten fiscal years, the number of cruise ship arrivals has remained fairly consistent, between 101 and 117 arrivals. The 101 arrivals during FY 2024-25 marked the fewest number of arrivals in the past 10 years, excluding the pandemic impacted years,” Baker wrote.
“However, the last fiscal year had the largest average number of passengers per arrival, with an average of 3,519 passengers, a 12.2% increase from the prior fiscal year. Cruise ship operators arriving in Avalon have been transitioning to larger vessels since resuming operations after the pandemic, which has increased wharfage revenues while maintaining approximately the same number of days with cruise ship arrivals,” Baker wrote.
(For related news, see the article about the Avalon-Carnival agreement in this issue.)
“On September 3, 2024, the City Council adopted a rate increase of $2.50 per passenger for a new per passenger rate of $7.50 effective January 1, 2026 based on the findings of a rate analysis performed by City Staff. The rate increase is estimated to increase cruise ship wharfage revenues by $750,000 annually to the Harbor Fund.
According to Baker’s report, cruise ship revenue accounts for 20% of Harbor Department operating revenue.
“As a result of prior rate increases and increased occupancy, cruise ship wharfage has been the fastest growing revenue and accounts for the majority of revenue growth in the Harbor Fund. In addition to the wharfage revenues generated, cruise ship passengers account for approximately one third of all visitors to the City and contribute an estimated $20 million of taxable sales activity for businesses located in the City,” Baker wrote. (According to a footnote in the staff report, the estimate assumes 60% of the passengers will disembark and spend $66.30 each, based on a Chamber of Commerce 2017 economic survey, adjusted for inflation.)
