MAINE PUBLIC • October 11, 2022
Cruise ship passengers make up less than 10% of visitors to Bar Harbor each year. But as Mount Desert Island's tourist economy has grown in recent years, cruise ships have become a flashpoint in a years-long debate over how much is too much. A citizen's initiative would cap the number of daily cruise ship passengers at 1,000 through changes to the town's land use ordinance. But the town's new plan will limit the number of daily cruise passengers to 3,800 people, with the exception of July and August, when daily caps of 3,500 will be in effect. It will also set monthly caps on cruise ship passengers — 30,000 each during May and June, 40,000 each during July and August, and 65,000 each in September and October. No ships will come in April or November.