Identification and Differentiation of the Hierarchical Structure of the Caribbean Cruise Shipping Network Based on Route Organization

Yichao Gou and Chengjin Wang
Additional contact information
Yichao Gou: Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Chengjin Wang: Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 15, 1-15

Abstract: In recent years, with the continuous expansion of the global cruise tourism market, global and regional cruise shipping networks have gradually formed and improved. Among them, the Caribbean cruise shipping network is particularly mature and complex, with a typical regional spatial organization. This paper takes cruise routes as the starting point to analyze the basic characteristics of the Caribbean cruise shipping network, investigate their hierarchical structure and spatial differentiation characteristics, and summarize the general spatial laws of a regional cruise shipping network. The results show that Caribbean cruise routes are mostly circular, and some of them have multi-circular sections. Medium and short cruise routes are common, and most cruise routes usually include sailings that last for a week. The cruise network forms an inverted V shape with the Florida Peninsula as the core connecting the eastern and western Caribbean Seas. There are differences in the number of sailings and centrality of different ports, thus forming the functional differentiation of core hub ports, functional hub ports, and general ports. The Caribbean cruise shipping network is divided into different hierarchies; with the increasing complexity of hierarchies, the numbers of ports and shipping groups have increased, the number of sailings and the centrality show rising trends, and the structure of the cruise shipping network tends to be complicated and the coverage tends to be broad. The three hierarchies basically reflect the core, skeleton, and overall pattern of the Caribbean regional cruise shipping network, and the core hierarchy includes most of the core hub ports.

Keywords: cruise ship; caribbean; cruise route; port; network hierarchy; shipping group; differentiation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/15/9448/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/15/9448/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:15:p:9448-:d:878041

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().