Brittany Ferries' vast 2,400-capacity flagship vessel Pont-Aven is to begin operating from Portsmouth next April.
The £130m ship will ferry passengers on a 24-hour overnight crossing to Santander in northern Spain – eight hours faster than other p
assenger services on that route.
She will sail to Spain and back on Mondays and Tuesdays, and will provide much-needed extra capacity on the Portsmouth-St Malo route from Wednesdays to Mondays.
The Pont-Aven will replace the 2,056-capacity Bretagne, which had sailed from Portsmouth to St Malo, and will now move to Plymouth, operating a separate passenger service to Santander.
The firm said Portsmouth's access to London and the home counties made it the strongest candidate to capitalise on the growing market for passenger journeys to Spain, as well as the booming freight traffic between the two countries.
Stephen Tuckwell, Brittany Ferries' director of Portsmouth's port operations, said: 'It will definitely lead to an increase in traffic to Spain. The other reason is to add to the St Malo route because during the summer it's absolutely choc-a-bloc.'
'It may be that in these difficult economic times, people are staying closer to home rather than flying off around the world.
Phil Gadd, Portsmouth ferry port manager, said: 'The French routes Brittany Ferries operate from our port are very popular and we are sure the Santander crossing will be just as successful.
'This new destination offers more choice to our loyal passengers who use Portsmouth regularly, and it will also attract new customers who are keen to get to northern Spain by ferry.'
The full article contains 286 words and appears in The News newspaper.
