Olympia Terminal
Encyclopedia
The Olympia Terminal is a dock
Dock (maritime)
A dock is a human-made structure or group of structures involved in the handling of boats or ships, usually on or close to a shore.However, the exact meaning varies among different variants of the English language...

 in the South Harbour of Helsinki
Helsinki
Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is...

, Finland
Finland
Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

. It was designed by the Hytönen-Luukkonen architects bureau and opened for the 1952 Summer Olympics
1952 Summer Olympics
The 1952 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Helsinki, Finland in 1952. Helsinki had been earlier given the 1940 Summer Olympics, which were cancelled due to World War II...

.

Today, the terminal has a regular connection to Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...

, acting as Silja Line
Silja Line
Silja Line is a Finnish cruiseferry brand operated by the Estonian ferry company AS Tallink Grupp, for car and passenger traffic between Finland and Sweden. The former company Silja Oy – today Tallink Silja Oy – is a subsidiary of Tallink Grupp, handling marketing and sales for Tallink and Silja...

's Helsinki terminal. Over 1.5 million passengers travel through the Olympia Terminal annually. A currency exchange
Currency exchange
Currency exchange can refer to:* Bureau de change* Foreign exchange market...

 point, an ATM
Automated teller machine
An automated teller machine or automatic teller machine, also known as a Cashpoint , cash machine or sometimes a hole in the wall in British English, is a computerised telecommunications device that provides the clients of a financial institution with access to financial transactions in a public...

 and a café
Café
A café , also spelled cafe, in most countries refers to an establishment which focuses on serving coffee, like an American coffeehouse. In the United States, it may refer to an informal restaurant, offering a range of hot meals and made-to-order sandwiches...

 are present in the building.

History

The (Helsinki Marine Station), was opened on 16 July 1952, just before the Olympics. The building was designed by architects Aarre Hytönen and Risto-Veikko Luukkonen. The first ship to use the new passenger pavilion was , arriving from Stockholm on the opening day. SS Bore I was also the first ship to depart from the harbour, as it set off on its return journey at 19:00. The next day, arrived and the day after that, arrived. The Olympic pier was first used by cruise ships to Stockholm.

When the Olympia Terminal was completed in 1952, it was visited by over 90,000 passengers annually, but only in summer and autumn. Silja Line started all-year-round traffic from the Olympia Terminal to Stockholm in 1972 and regular traffic to Tallinn in 1995. However, regular traffic to Tallinn from the Olympia Terminal ceased in 2005. The terminal and its ferry docks were renovated in 1989/1990 to handle larger ships. The facility includes two cruiseferry
Cruiseferry
A cruiseferry is a ship that combines the features of a cruise ship with a Ro-Pax ferry. Many passengers travel with the ships for the cruise experience, staying only a few hours at the destination port or not leaving the ship at all, while others use the ships as means of...

docks and sets of driving ramps.

External links

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