After a record-breaking boom in cruise ship tourism following the COVID-19 pandemic, city leaders in Juneau have been publicly considering if — and how — they can limit that growth in the coming years.
Now they’ve negotiated an agreement with cruise lines that they believe does just that. Starting in 2026, Juneau will have a cap on the number of daily passengers that come off cruise ships: 16,000 people on most days and 12,000 people on Saturdays. Currently, Juneau can see up to 21,000 visitors on its busiest days.
Juneau’s Visitor Industry Director Alix Pierce said the agreement was finalized Friday. She called it groundbreaking.
“This has been a hard-fought agreement for the city, and it is a huge win for the city,” she said. “It is exactly what I wanted out of this, and I’m extremely happy that we’re here.”
Earlier this month, the Juneau Assembly approved the limits.
Last year, a record-breaking 1.6 million passengers visited Juneau, with about the same expected this year and next. Pierce said the new agreement should keep the annual passenger count at that same level.
She said that will be key in curbing future growth while also protecting local businesses that rely on the industry.
“This was an effort to kind of thread the needle and balance the competing voices that we hear in our roles as public officials trying to work through this,” Pierce said.
But some residents in Juneau, like Karla Hart, said they are less than impressed. Hart is a longtime advocate who often criticizes the growth of tourism in Juneau and the effects it has on the people who live here year-round.
“The pretense that it’s doing anything to address the real issues of the community is just absurd. It’s not even worth the paper it’s written, so it’s totally worthless,” she said.
Hart said the agreement — and other agreements the city has done in the past to mitigate the impacts of the industry — are all for show.
“They’re not doing anything that really protects the community as a whole,” she said.
Because of that, she and other residents have been looking for ways to limit tourism without necessarily getting the consent of cruise lines.
Hart and four other residents are trying to get a question on the local ballot this October asking whether Juneau should ban all large cruise ships on Saturdays. So far, she said they’ve collected enough signatures to get it on the ballot, but the city clerk is still verifying them.
“I think that’s our best immediate vehicle to get word to the industry and to the city leaders, that the community wants some relief from this industry,” she said.
If the “ship-free Saturdays” ballot initiative gets passed by voters, that could go into effect as soon as next year.
But Pierce has long said negotiations are better than trying to enforce regulations. That’s because other communities have tried to do that and wound up in court.
And the cruise industry has sued Juneau in the past. A lawsuit over how the city spends the money it earns from passenger fees was settled in 2019, with both parties agreeing to work together to settle disputes outside of court.
“It’s not that the city is beholden to the cruise industry or anything like that. And I do hear that narrative sometimes,” Pierce said. “It’s more, it’s always a lot easier to solve a problem with somebody you have a positive relationship with, than somebody who you’re in a big, legal fight with all the time.”
Pierce said there could be a lot of unknown implications to passing a ballot initiative like this one — both legally and logistically. And she also doesn’t know how it might affect the new agreement.
“There was a ballot measure that limited cruise ships that passed in Bar Harbor, Maine, and there are lawsuits on top of lawsuits on top of injunctions on top of different trading legal barbs, and the city spent a lot of money on legal fees,” she said. “So I think there would be a lot of legal activity after a ballot initiative passed.”
The new agreement means once the limits go into effect in 2026, they will remain in place in perpetuity. But the city and cruise lines also agreed to meet annually, and changes can be made during those discussions.
