I believe some people had asked about Falmouth many months ago. Here is a story on it from the September 21 issue of The Washington Post. What's been done to Falmouth sounds awful.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/travel/in-jamaica-a-pop-up-port/2012/09/ 20/cf8d456e-f92b-11e1-a073-78d05495927c_story.html?wpisrc=nl_travel

Karen..."awe-full" doesn't scratch the surface of all the negative consequences which our environmental advocates were warning and screaming about, to no avail, during the planning of this Mega-All Exclusive.

And shouldn't an honest accounting be made of just what advantages/disadvantages are implied in Jamaica's financial, developmental and social programmes?

It seems to me that the new development for the cruise line perpetuates the historical master (cruise line) - servant (Jamaica) relationship which continues to exploit the Jamaican people.

Most of the profits from goods sold behind the walled gates to the port leave with the cruise ship and return to the cruise line's coffers in Miami. And most of the cruise passengers who left the Allure of the Seas when it was in port quickly headed out of Falmouth on cruise line excursions to Ocho Rio and Montego Bay.

...Oasis and the Allure, even though Royal Caribbean touts them as environmentally friendly ships, are burning the dirtiest and most dangerous fuel in the world - bunker fuel - which is essentially a tar-like refinery by-product. The non-combustible particles blacken the sky and pose a major health hazard to the health of people in a hundred mile radius.

Secondly, the presence of Royal Caribbean's new mega-ships in the little port required the destruction of some 35,000,000 cubic feet of coral reef and the destruction of two square miles of mangroves which are now buried under the now pulverized reef material.
Quite frankly when I visited Falmouth last year, I was taken back by the destruction I could see. But now I appreciate just how widespread and complete Royal Caribbean's plans were to destroy the reef and mangroves.

OnEarth Magazine explains:
"In Falmouth, to accommodate Allure and Oasis, wrecking crews had to smash a quarter-mile-wide opening in an offshore barrier reef. They dredged coral, both living and dead, as well as the rock substrate, and trucked it inland to a two-square-mile dump site -- a clear-cut area on the outskirts of town that was once a thriving red mangrove swamp.

Now all that’s left is 35 million cubic feet of pulverized coral and rubble.
When I visit the site with Roland Haye, a Jamaican environmental activist, he tells me, "As a boy, I used to play Tarzan here and see crocodile. It was a winter home for great heron and swan." He points out broken conch shells, dismembered starfish, bits of sea sponge, and severed lobes of brain coral."

Another problem is that the removal of the natural reef exposes the shore to pounding of the waves. When I visited, I observed that the road from Ocho Rios to Falmouth, previously protected by the reef, was literally covered with water from the encroaching waves. The road was already eroding.
--Jim Walker (Walker & O'Neill::Maritime Lawyers)


From the Professional Viewpoint of a Maritime Lawyer: Royal Caribbean's New Port in Falmouth, Jamaica - At What Cost to the Environment?
www.cruiselawnews.com/2012/07/articles/pollution-1/royal-caribbeans-new-port-in- falmouth-jamaica-at-what-cost-to-the-environment

Interview with JET's Muckraking Filmmaker Esther Figueroa
www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMDGiHQCixE&feature=relmfu

Jamaica's Land Reclamation & Coral Reef's Damages
http://coastalcare.org/2011/02/jamaicas-land-reclamation-and-coral-reefs-damages