Jadrolinija recorded 65% of record traffic in 2019
While most people are horrified by the very mention of the crowds waiting on the hot asphalt, accompanied by the bursting crickets, Jadrolinija in the Split ferry port is looking forward to increased traffic!
It looks like life is slowly coming back to normal, so full ferries sail to the central Dalmatian islands, which really pleases the local shipping company.
Counters, for example, work 24 hours a day, all to avoid crowds. They even manage such crowds because we were pleasantly surprised by a walk through the ferry port on Saturday morning where we did not find those famous traffic jams, nervousness and general chaos that would regularly greet us during the summer months, especially the first weekend of July.
This time the road to the station and the terminal is passable despite the works on the reconstruction of the City Port, many taxi drivers are waiting at the stops, Youth traffic unit is not too busy while a light wind brings them refreshment.
It is a completely unusual picture of the ferry port, so we ask Jelena Ivulić, the head of Jadrolinija in Split, what the secret is.
There are crowds, but everything is flowing, everything is fine, so it doesn’t look like it used to. We work non-stop, there is no waiting for boarding, and again, our ferries are full.
Here, this weekend we expect about 40,000 passengers in both directions and about 11,500 vehicles on ferries. Passengers arrive consistently, most tourists are from Slovenia, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and of course ours.
For now, there are no extraordinary lines, but since July 2, we have increased, as usual, the number of lines, so now we have 14 regular departures for Brac, seven for Starigrad, three for Vis, six for Solta …
The summer sailing schedule includes later departures, so at midnight is the last ferry to Supetar, at 1:30 in the morning to Starigrad … Certainly, the ferries are nicely filled, but there is no waiting. Let it continue like this, and we are there for the passengers, available 24 hours a day.
Jelena Ivulić
Remembering the former chaos in the port
Once, there were lines of boarding vehicles all the way to Koteks. She says they are now, compared to 2019, at 65% of turnover. But they go further, optimistically, as the madness around the pandemic subsides, so the tourists arrive.
Some, on the other hand, wander for hours looking for free parking in the city centre.
Every now and then there is madness behind the Bishop’s Palace. Tourists somehow realize that there is no parking fee and the GPS shows them that it is a good location near the centre, the station, and the rush with caravans and vans inside.
Right now, everything was congested for hours because the German could not turn around, and a dozen cars went inside – a driver tells us, obviously familiar with the situation at that location.
Random driver in the port
The return of the cruiser
There are no wandering tourists as far as cruise passengers who arrive every now and then on the outer breakwater of the ferry port.
This Saturday, MSC Magnifica, which sails the eastern Mediterranean from Italy, is on the line. This floating giant went through a real odyssey last year since it set sail before the “season” of COVID, and as it was hit by a global pandemic along the way, passengers did not land for six weeks.
Hopefully, the rough stories are behind us and now Magnifica has brought about 1,200 passengers to Split who can visit the city, but under strict measures.
Vicko Vrgoč, head of the Port Operations Center says there is no separation from the group, everything is going well in the port, there are no crowds, no extraordinary ferries, the works are in progress, but they do not interfere with traffic.
He also says that the arrival of 155 cruisers in Split has been announced for this year, but all this is very uncertain and depends on the pandemic. We remind you that the record year was 2016 when 286 cruisers came to Split.
Source: Slobodnadalmacija.hr
