Key Aspects:
- Upcoming sailings for Carnival Radiance and Carnival Firenze have parking restrictions and limited availability at Long Beach.
- Very few offsite spaces are available and they are subject to a variety of restrictions, including no oversized vehicles or back-to-back cruise parking.
- With cruise capacity at Long Beach continuing to increase, these parking difficulties may also increase for future sailings.
Parking problems are nothing new at the Port of Long Beach, but now, three upcoming cruises will all experience a shortage of available spaces for eager guests.
The impacted sailings are the September 15 and September 19 sailings of Carnival Radiance, a 4-night and 3-night Baja Mexico sailing, respectively.
The September 18 departure of Carnival Firenze has the same restriction. That cruise is a 5-night Mexican Riviera itinerary.
Booked guests have all received the same notification alerting them – very strongly! – to the parking shortage.
“The parking facility at the cruise terminal has very limited capacity,” the email explained. “Please make plans to use alternate transportation that does not require parking.”
There is hope for guests who do drive to the port, however.
“We have secured a few extra spaces at an offsite facility,” the notification said.
Those few extra spaces do come with more than a few restrictions, however. Vehicles higher than 6 feet, 6 inches cannot be accommodated, nor can any vehicles that might use more than one parking space, such as RVs or trailers.
Furthermore, guests on back-to-back cruises are also prohibited from the offsite facility, which can only accommodate vehicles for one voyage.
If guests need accessible parking, those even more limited spaces are first-come, first-served and subject to availability.
Guests who can take advantage of the extremely limited parking will need to drop off their luggage and traveling party at the cruise terminal in order to pick up directions and an entry card for the offsite facility. The guests’ boarding pass will be checked once they reach the parking area.
The parking site is $23 per day, including both embarkation and debarkation days. Payment is required in advance, and only card payments are accepted.
Read Also: Full Guide on Long Beach Cruise Terminal Parking
Complimentary shuttles will be available to take guests to and from the cruise terminal. The last shuttle will leave the parking facility 30 minutes before the ship’s final boarding time, which guests can find on their boarding passes.
Once again, Carnival is strongly urging guests to find alternative ways to get to the Long Beach cruise terminal.
“To improve your embarkation experience and avoid the hassle of parking at an offsite location, we highly recommend taking a ride share or getting dropped off for your cruise,” the notification concludes.
Will the Parking Situation at Long Beach Improve?
This is not the first time parking has been limited at the Port of Long Beach, but the urgency of the language in Carnival’s notification letters appears to be getting stronger.
Similar notifications go back at least to late 2022, when Carnival Miracle faced parking shortages for multiple cruises.
In the meantime, cruise popularity at Long Beach has only increased, with more (and larger!) ships sailing from the southern California homeport.
Carnival Miracle, for comparison, has a double occupancy capacity of 2,124. The ships impacted today, Carnival Radiance and Carnival Firenze, have capacities of 2,984 and 4,126, respectively.
Carnival Firenze is scheduled to redeploy to Miami in early 2027, but a replacement (if any) has not yet been announced.
If Carnival Cruise Line were to homeport an even larger ship from Long Beach, such as one of the Excel-class ships, the parking problem could become even more critical.
The cruise line has not yet released complete deployment plans for Long Beach for 2028, though such announcements should be forthcoming over the next few weeks.
