Assesing Home Port Potential of Selected Adriatic Ports

The cruise industry has been continuously growing since the 1970s and is considered to be the fastest growing travel vacation segment ever. The Mediterranean is currently the second most visited region, closely following the Caribbean. One of the Mediterranean cruise markets is the increasingly interesting Adriatic Sea, with Venice and Dubrovnik as the most popular destinations. While a port of call destination need only offer attractions to be added to cruise line itineraries, much more is required of home ports, particularly in terms of infrastructure and passenger services. Currently, the ports of Venice and Bari act as main home ports in the Adriatic, with the port of Trieste growing in importance although it does not as yet have a considerable share in terms of number of exchanged cruise passengers. In this paper, the authors take a look at the advantages that these ports offer in terms of home port adequacy and examine the home port potential of two Adriatic ports, namely the port of Koper and the port of Split. For this purpose, a list of influencing factors was drawn up based on existing studies and adjusted to the specific micro conditions and requirements. These factors are examined.