On Monday April 14th, were held some meetings for promoting Progreso with Royal Caribbean International, Celebrity Cruises and Carnival Cruise Lines where the Delegation of Yucatan presented the Integral Tourism Development Program of Progreso, crew members attention project, where the cruise lines’ executives has the opportunity of feeding back the projects with their comments.

The Integral Tourism Development Project for Progreso is focused in the Community of Yucatan and the cruise ships’ passengers, with the objective of building pedestrians’ areas, both natural as well as commercial, and also cultural and tourism leisure areas.

The crew members attention Project is based on developing an exclusive area for crew members with the following facilities: internet service, medical service, hair dresser, swimming pool, restrooms, special areas for leisure and sports activities, with the objective of satisfying the needs of the crew members at their arrival to Progreso and satisfying the cruise lines at their arrival; this Project is a pilot for the other 15 Federal APIS, being Progreso the current model nation wide.

We must outline that Progreso is currently the 2nd most important Port for the Cruise Ship Lines, right behind Montego Bay in Jamaica, for 60f the passengers comes down the ship to visit the site. This is very favorable for the permanence in the cruise ships market.

The comments of the executives were very favorable for these two projects, they stated their interest in investing in the port as they have done n other ports in Dubai, Jamaica, Honduras and South America.

The representatives were:
By the State Government of Yucatan, Mr. Adolfo Peniche Perez, General Coordinator of the SIFIDEY."FONDO YUCATAN".
Mr. Jorge Ongay, Architect of the Project.
By API Progreso, Promotion Under Manager, Ms. Sonia Tames Arenas.

The ships that they have currently covering the Caribbean and Progreso in the mid term are going to be destined to covering the European routes, a growing market, due to the strength of the euro, and in Progreso they are programming larger ships, and for that reason, they requested, as a necessity, the draught of the Port to be able to dock; today, the largest ship to dock on Progreso is the Voyager of the Seas with 142,000 TRB’s, 3,835 passengers, 1,176 crew members, 29 feet of draught and 311 m of length and 48 m of breadth.

In a few days will be announced some projects for increasing cargo ships, which, along with these projects will increase the arrivals to Progreso.