Cruise Industry Boosts Texas Economy
In the past year, the cruising sector has contributed $1.33 billion to the Texas economy, which is an increase of 5.3% from 2013. The nation’s fourth-busiest cruise port, Galveston, reported 640,000 passengers. Three-quarters of a million passengers departed from Texas ports in the past year. This is due to a general increase of business and larger ships in a larger amount coming into Galveston.
According to reports, around 43% of the money generated by cruising went into airlines, hotels, travel agencies, restaurants, and other service-related things. This puts Texas behind only Florida and California in terms of economic gain from cruise travel.
Galveston is investing about $13 million to expand its second terminal accommodate Royal Caribbean’s Liberty of the Seas.
Although the cruise industry has been looking at markets in Europe, Asia, and South America, there is still plenty of growth anticipated in the U.S.