Swansea cork ferries closed its route in 2006 but after much campaigning Fastnet re-opened the route. However after just a year of operation they stopped services again. Why hasn’t there been any motivation to re-open the route? Does any one have pictures of superferry when it was operating the route?
The first time the company couldn’t find another vessel I thought. Wasn’t tourism hit quite hard on both sides?
http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=1219655 I spent 10 hours on the 'Celtic Pride' in July 1992. A kip of a ship. With improvements of the A40/A477 in West Wales, the N25 in Southern Ireland, regular Irish Ferries/Stena crossings to Rosslare and cheap Ryanair flights, there is no way a Swansea Cork ferry could ever be profitable today. The market has changed with the short sea crossings much preferred, (as seen with the lack of pax on Liverpool Dublin P&O routes which are aimed at freight, with pax facilities nowhere near the level of Ulysses/Stena Adventurer, etc, on the Holyhead Dublin route). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Aallotar#/media/File:Celtic_Pride.jpg
Thanks for the link, I'd forgotten about those poor kids who died on the ship. Swansea-Cork has never flourished as a crossing, and probably the end of Duty Free was a nail in the coffin. Also I seem to remember there are serious draft issues in Swansea harbour?
I took a cycle group on that route both ways the month before. The trip outward bound is not one that I will never forget. No sooner than we exited the Bristol channel in to the open Atlantic, we were in for a rough trip in a ferry with shallow draught (16ft) designed for use in the Baltic. The following morning some members of the group looked like death warmed up. The final hour of the trip into Cork Harbour did make up for the rotten night that we had before. Going back was not as bad as the outward trip, but both ways members of the group commented about the smell coming from the cabin tolets.
Exactly, today the Fishguard - Rosslare route is struggling, mainly because the Holyhead - Dublin route is abstracting all the traffic. The draft length at Swansea is the biggest problem, limiting the freight capacity of the vessel (freight is where the money is on ferry routes these days)
