The first cruise ship of the Alaska tourism season, the Carnival Spirit, arrived Thursday afternoon. It was scheduled to leave Thursday evening after a brief eight-hour stay.
Another ship was expected to arrive Friday, with a total of 38 different vessels and nearly a million passengers expected to make port calls to Alaska's capital over the course of just five months.
Each year the tourist season in Juneau arrives at the most opportune time: right after lawmakers leave. Many here say that, were it not for the cruise ship season, the town would become a ghost town in summer.
As it is now, these ships pump nearly $200 million into the local economy -- an estimated $9 million a week for the next 22 weeks.
The Juneau Convention and Visitor Bureau says that influx of cash directly provides 2,000 Juneau jobs each year, as well as another 500 indirect jobs. Young people are grateful for the work, which boosts payrolls here by almost $100 million.
While all the tourists Juneau has seen in 34 years of cruise-ship visits cause some inconvenience, most Juneauites seem okay with their lightning-quick visits since few stay for a full day. After all, this year's strong passenger projections may be a sign that the economy in the Lower 48 may be rebounding slightly.
The record year here was more than a million visitors in 2008, before the bottom fell out of the economy that September. With visits from recreational vehicles facing a possible decline due to $4-a-gallon gas, however, cruise-ship traffic seems poised for an uptick.
Email Dan Fiorucci
