Statistics - national statistics: Sea Passenger Statistics: 2013

The main findings for 2013 include:

• The number of short sea international ferry journeys increased by 4% to 20.5 million following 2 years of decline.

• Dover remained the busiest UK sea port, carrying 12.7 million short sea international ferry passengers. This was a 7% annual increase but remained 20% lower than 10 years previously.

• In 2012 more passengers travelled internationally via the Channel Tunnel than ferries for the first time. However, in 2013, ferries accounted for 1.7 million (9%) more international journeys than the Channel Tunnel.

• Passenger traffic on domestic sea crossings has steadily declined over the last decade. The number of passengers travelling by ferry from Great Britain to Northern Ireland and the Channel Islands increased to 2.1 and 0.4 million respectively.

Final sea passenger statistics will be published in autumn 2014, including data for passengers on international cruises, long sea journeys, domestic river crossings and inter-island domestic routes, which are currently not available for 2013.