THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, February 12, 1996 TAG: 9602100180
SECTION: BUSINESS WEEKLY PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Early this month, the largest container ship in the world, the Regina Maersk, docked at Rotterdam, loaded 1,300 boxes in 12 hours, and departed on its maiden voyage for the Far East.
Just as the United States sent its bluewater Navy on a world cruise to show off its power near the turn of the century, so did Maersk, the Copenhaven ship line, steam the 87,000-ton Regina Maersk into Rotterdam to send a message, in this case to the ports of West Europe: Lower your rates.
Throughout the world, ship lines are forming alliances in control of huge merchant fleets. And the ships are ever larger. Some yards are building container ships on the scale of Regina Maersk, which can haul 6,000 20-foot boxes.
Big fleets give the alliances the upper hand in negotiating rates with ports. ``There are always alternatives'' to Rotterdam, said Maersk executive Michael F. Hassing after the Regina Maersk sailed.
In April, Maersk and Sea-Land Service Inc., an arm of CSX Corp. of Richmond, will form the world's largest shipping alliance - 175 vessels with a capacity of 500,000 20-foot containers.
Not only Rotterdam will feel the combines' weight. In the western Atlantic, the alliances will shake the ports at Philadelphia, Baltimore and Charleston, predicts consultants Booz-Allen & Hamilton.
Booz-Allen's winners: New York and New Jersey, Halifax, and Hampton Roads, currently the largest port on the East Coast after New York. Of course, New York and New Jersey are squabbling about dredging deeper water for the big ships.
Rest homes: Lots of military personnel retire in Hampton Roads. And the Williamsburg area quietly has come in favor among some affluent retirees from the Northeast corridor. But Tidewater never has made a lasting national impression as a retirement haven.
After reviewing some of the country's popular retirement cities, New Choices magazine picked its favorites: Burlington, Vt.; Chapel Hill, N.C.; Gulf Shores, Ala.; Hot Springs, Ark.; Las Cruces, N.M.; Myrtle Beach, S.C.; Winter Haven, Fla. One important criteria for New Choices: inexpensive houses.
Sea power: Almost every cab driver in town can tell you the world's largest naval base is Norfolk Naval Base with its 136 ships (136, that is, including Little Creek). But did you also know Norfolk Naval Base, though it does little promotion, ranks among Hampton Roads' Top 10 tourist draws?
That's right. The Virginia Waterfront tourism campaign surveyed Northeastern callers and found the base was the No. 10 attraction last summer.
The Navy's own survey counted 345,052 base visitors in '95, including 149,561 visits to the Hampton Roads Naval Museum inside Nauticus.
Norfolk Naval Base, at the end of Interstate 564, could become a larger tourist draw. Last fall, base gate security was relaxed. Now the Navy is considering asking Virginia to install a first-class information center for tourists overlooking Hampton Roads near the aircraft carrier piers at Sewells Point. It's part of the Navy's plan to privatize big chunks of the base.
Tourist haunts: Malls are popular, too. That's what The Virginia Waterfront's tourist survey found last summer. These were the survey's Top 20 tourist haunts - the number refers to the percentage of callers who identified this activity:
1) Went to the Oceanfront, 57.6 percent; 2) Busch Gardens, 48.2 percent; 3) Colonial Williamsburg, 47.7 percent; 4) shopping malls, 45.7 percent; 5) Waterside, 26.7 percent; 6) Jamestown, 25.0 percent; 7) Water Country, 20.6 percent; 8) Yorktown, 19.2 percent; 9) Virginia Beach Marine Science Museum, 16.1 percent; 10) Norfolk Naval Base, 11.0 percent.
11) Nauticus, 10.0 percent; 12) Hampton's Virginia Air & Space Museum, 8.7 percent; 13) boat tours, 8.6 percent; 14) Newport News' Mariners' Museum, 5.9 percent; 15) MacArthur Memorial, 5.7 percent; 16) Norfolk Zoo, 4.7 percent; 17) Norfolk Botanical Garden, 4.6 percent; 18) Newport News' Virginia Living Museum, 4.6 percent; 19) Norfolk's Chrysler Art Museum, 2.6 percent; 20) Portsmouth's Children's Museum, 1.7 percent. by CNB