Estonia, Good for Business, Port, Russia, Tourism, Transport

The director of the St. Petersburg passenger port, Alexei Panfilov, said that Tallink is about to operate two special cruises to the Russian city on April 30 and July 2 next year with a view to opening a regular service in the future. 

"In perspective, we could see a partner in Tallink Silja Line," Panfilov said at a press conference organized by TASS new agency.

Katri Link, head of communication at Tallink, said that the company has no plans at this point for opening a regular service to St. Petersburg.

"We are, however, pondering special cruises to St. Petersburg in 2020 similarly to the special cruises to Riga, Visby and Aland operated earlier. We are about to approve the destinations for the special cruises of 2020 shortly," Link told.

Tallink launched a regular Tallinn-St. Petersburg-Helsinki operation in April 2004 but halted it in January the following year citing an unexpected increase in port fees in St. Petersburg.

A Tallinn-St. Petersburg service is currently operated by the company Moby SPL, which previously operated as St. Peter Line.

Tallink's market share in terms of the number of passengers carried to and from Tallinn was 57% t last year, compared with 1% carried by Moby SPL. The port of Tallinn served a record 10.6 mln passengers during 2018.