Cleveland’s cruise boom faces new competition as American Cruise Lines moves to Buffalo

The Port of Cleveland opened a customs facility on the lakefront in 2019 to accommodate the growing number of Great Lakes cruisers.

CLEVELAND, Ohio – The Port of Cleveland is expected to welcome 55 cruise ships in 2026, carrying more than 9,000 passengers, a new record for the city.

One ship, however, will be missing from the lineup: the new American Patriot, a 130-passenger ship from American Cruise Lines, sailing for the first time in the Great Lakes next year.

The Connecticut-based company announced in September that it planned to start and end several of its Great Lakes itineraries in Cleveland, a move that would have generated additional economic benefits for the city through hotel stays and visitor spending.

The Pearl Mist cruise ship made a stop in Cleveland on Wednesday morning, September 10, 2025, with nearly 200 passengers, most of whom disembarked to go on a variety of excursions.

Then, abruptly, a month later, the company changed course: Rather than leaving from Cleveland, it would sail from Buffalo, New York, instead, and stop in Toledo — skipping Cleveland as a port of call altogether.

At the time, a spokesperson for the company said it couldn’t find the right place to dock in Cleveland.

“Unfortunately, we have been unable to find a suitable docking location in Cleveland for 2026 that meets American’s operational needs, but we look forward to ongoing discussions with the city,” said public relations manager Alexa Paolella.

A Great Lakes cruise ship Victory II arrives at the Port of Cleveland for service. Its sister vessel, Victory I, arrived two hours earlier loaded with passengers ready to explore Cleveland destinations. This will be a record cruising year with 55 calls scheduled to Cleveland solidifying Clevelands status as one of the hottest Great Lakes cruise destinations.

The president of the International Longshoremen’s Union local in Cleveland said the company didn’t want to pay for dock labor to tie up the ship at the Port of Cleveland. “They feel they can do it on their own,” said John D. Baker, president of ILA local 1317.

He added that the union is still hoping to work something out with the cruise company to bring it to Cleveland.

Paolella declined additional comment.

The dispute highlights a broader trend in Great Lakes cruising: growing competition among cities seeking the economic benefits of attracting affluent cruise travelers, even for brief port visits.

Cleveland, an early leader in this new era of Great Lakes cruising, welcomed its first cruise ship in 2017. Since then, it’s welcomed hundreds of ship visits from nearly a dozen different cruise lines, including Viking, Victory, Ponant, Pearl Seas and others. Many itineraries start in Toronto and end in Milwaukee or Chicago, with Cleveland often serving as the only stop on Lake Erie.

That may be changing, said Dave Gutheil, chief operating officer at the Port of Cleveland. “I think it’s inevitable there’s going to be competition.”

A recent economic impact study from the port found that cruise passengers spend an average of about $150 in Cleveland, for a total of approximately $1.3 million in direct visitor spending annually.

When factoring in dock operations, transportation and other indirect spending, the total economic impact exceeds $2 million, according to the port.

Buffalo and Toledo enter the market

Buffalo, at the eastern end of Lake Erie, hasn’t hosted a cruise ship in decades.

A 2024 study commissioned by the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp., an economic development arm of the state of New York, concluded that the city could attract as many as 12,000 cruise guests by 2035 with the right investments.

The agency is in the early stages of developing a new cruise terminal on Buffalo’s Outer Harbor. Expected to open in 2027, the terminal will include a customs area, restrooms and other amenities.

Mark Wendel, president of the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp., said there’s enough interest in Great Lakes cruising to support multiple ports of call on Lake Erie.

“This is not a competition,” he said. “There’s enough for everyone to have stops, and to assist in the growth of Great Lakes cruising.”

Because the city’s new terminal will not be finished until 2027, American Cruise Lines is negotiating a temporary docking arrangement in Buffalo for the 2026 season.

Wendel said he is also talking with Victory Cruise Lines about making stops in Buffalo starting in 2027. “I’m hoping to have conversations with a lot of different cruise lines,” he said. “We’ll probably start slow, with one or two, and add more.”

American Cruise Lines will be unique in the Great Lakes market in that it plans to sail only between U.S. ports, meaning guests won’t have to carry a passport or go through customs.

In 2026, American Cruise Lines will sail its nine-day American Great Lakes Cruise from Buffalo to Milwaukee four times, with stops in Toledo and Detroit, Alpena, Mackinac Island and Holland, Michigan.

Toledo, too, is new to modern-day Great Lakes cruising.

This past summer, it welcomed its first cruise passengers in decades.

Victory Cruise Lines – which sails two ships in the Great Lakes all summer – made its first call in Toledo in late May 2025, a substitute destination for a previously planned stop in Detroit, which was preparing for the Detroit Grand Prix auto race.

The Victory ships docked at the Amrize Cement Terminal on the Maumee River, just north of downtown, according to Kayla Cunningham, communications manager for the Toledo Port Authority.

Cunningham said Amrize didn’t charge Victory to dock, though the cruise line covered the cost of security and other expenses.

She added, “It has not yet been determined whether this dock will be used for cruise ship calls in 2026.”

Sara Smith, director of institutional advancement at the National Museum of the Great Lakes in Toledo, has been working with both Victory and American Cruise Lines on itinerary ideas and possible docking opportunities at the museum, also located on the Maumee River.

“We believe it’s a perfect fit for Great Lakes cruisers to have the opportunity to visit our one-and-only national museum,” she said.

Cost, infrastructure and labor

Cruise industry consultant Roger Blum said cruise lines consider several factors when deciding which ports of call to visit: the port’s infrastructure (“can the ship even fit?”); the destination’s attractions (“is this a place people want to go?”); and cost.

“Each port has its own costs,” said Blum, principal at Cruise & Port Advisors in Florida. There are ancillary costs, as well, including, in some cases, the required use of private dock workers.

In Cleveland, cruise ships dock just west of Huntington Bank Field at the Port of Cleveland.

The Cleveland port charges cruise ships a dockage fee, which is based both on the size of the ship and the number of passengers. Cruise ships in Cleveland are assessed $15 for every passenger, plus 7.5 cents per gross ton.

In comparison, Port Milwaukee calculates its fees based on a ship’s length, plus an $11 per passenger fee.

Gutheil, with the Port of Cleveland, said the passenger fee in Cleveland is collected in part to recoup the costs of building an $800,000 customs facility in 2019 to screen cruise passengers.

But port costs aren’t the only charges that cruise lines face.

In Cleveland, the cruise lines all contract with Logistec, a Canadian company that assists cargo and cruise ships with docking, unloading, restocking and other on-shore tasks.

“All the cruise lines that come into Cleveland have an agreement with Logistec,” said Gutheil. “Logistec manages the labor union, and the union provides labor to tie up the vessels when they arrive, take off the lines upon departure and also provide labor for any supplies the vessel is taking in during its time at port.”

Baker, the union president, said American Cruise Lines may face similar pushback in other communities if it insists on providing its own shore workers.

“They’re going to have the same problem in Buffalo and all over,” said Baker.

Even without the American Patriot, the Port of Cleveland is still expecting a record number of cruise calls in 2026.

One of the reasons Cleveland port calls are so popular is because of central docking location, which allows passengers to visit more than one attraction in a day – the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in the morning, for example, and then the West Side Market or the Cleveland Museum of Art in the afternoon.

Still, Gutheil said, as the city makes plans to redevelop the waterfront in the coming years, it might sense to incorporate a new cruise terminal closer to E. Ninth Street.

“It’s an industrial area,” he said. “Ideally, I would like to see them go somewhere more aesthetically pleasing.”