Plans for a cruise liner terminal complete with hotel, restaurants, casino, cinema and shopping centre in the 'Millennium Capital' of Britain, Greenwich, have now received full planning permission from Greenwich Council. Work was due to have begun on the site in July 2001.
Unfortunately, it was recently learned (June 2001) that the liner terminal component of this development may not now go ahead owing to City concerns that the numbers of potential visiting ships may not warrant the facility.
The world's largest liners would have been able to dock, giving passengers a welcome worthy of London, and in particular Deptford and Greenwich, both steeped in major areas of maritime history.
The £80 million development at Deptford Creek, just to the west of Greenwich Town Centre and the location of the famous tea clipper, the Cutty Sark, will transform the Greenwich stretch of the Thames and provide an estimated 1,500 jobs in an area of high unemployment.
A deal has been signed between developers Clearwater Estates and Greenwich Reach Developments, which owns the eight acre site.
Liners of up to 50,000 tonnes and 240 metres long would have been able to dock at the terminal which is located at an existing deep water berth known as Greenwich Tier that for many years has hosted visits from new liners on their maiden voyages as well as naval vessels such as H.M.S. Ark Royal. However, these do not carry the fare-paying passengers that the developers hope will bring life back to the river and a new prosperity to a famous, but much neglected area.
The Port of London Authority are reported as saying: "As conservators of the Thames we are delighted that big (passenger-carrying) liners will be able to come so far into central London."