Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Port Docks Expansion

#GalwayPortPlan – The Connacht Tribune reports that the decision on Galway Harbour on the proposed redevelopment of the docks will be announced by An Bórd Pleanála next Friday, September 11.

The planning appeals board has been deliberating on plans for the €126 million redevelopment of the docks since an oral hearing took place in January.

The proposal has the potential to transform the face of Galway into the next century, according to proponents of the projects. The 85.4 hectare project, which is expected to take eight years to construct, will be built in four phases.

For more on the proposed expansion of the mid-west port, click this link.

Note the newspaper has a photo of the harbour showing leisure craft and commercial shipping sharing the port's Dún Aengus Dock.

On the right side can be seen the stern of the aptly named Galway Fisher, an oil products tanker that regularly calls to the port which requires a very skillful approach (see video) through the dock chamber.

Published in Galway Harbour

About Brittany Ferries

In 1967 a farmer from Finistère in Brittany, Alexis Gourvennec, succeeded in bringing together a variety of organisations from the region to embark on an ambitious project: the aim was to open up the region, to improve its infrastructure and to enrich its people by turning to traditional partners such as Ireland and the UK. In 1972 BAI (Brittany-England-Ireland) was born.

The first cross-Channel link was inaugurated in January 1973, when a converted Israeli tank-carrier called Kerisnel left the port of Roscoff for Plymouth carrying trucks loaded with Breton vegetables such as cauliflowers and artichokes. The story, therefore, begins on 2 January 1973, 24 hours after Great Britain's entry into the Common Market (EEC).

From these humble beginnings however, Brittany Ferries as the company was re-named quickly opened up to passenger transport, then became a tour operator.

Today, Brittany Ferries has established itself as the national leader in French maritime transport: an atypical leader, under private ownership, still owned by a Breton agricultural cooperative.

Eighty five percent of the company’s passengers are British.

Key Brittany Ferries figures:

  • Turnover: €202.4 million (compared with €469m in 2019)
  • Investment in three new ships, Galicia plus two new vessels powered by cleaner LNG (liquefied natural gas) arriving in 2022 and 2023
  • Employment: 2,474 seafarers and shore staff (average high/low season)
  • Passengers: 752,102 in 2020 (compared with 2,498,354 in 2019)
  • Freight: 160,377 in 2020 (compared with 201,554 in 2019)
  • Twelve ships operating services that connect France, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain (non-Covid year) across 14 routes
  • Twelve ports in total: Bilbao, Santander, Portsmouth, Poole, Plymouth, Cork, Rosslare, Caen, Cherbourg, Le Havre, Saint-Malo, Roscoff
  • Tourism in Europe: 231,000 unique visitors, staying 2.6 million bed-nights in France in 2020 (compared with 857,000 unique visitors, staying 8,7 million bed-nights in 2019).