Southeast : Queen Mary to Stay Docked in Long Beach

Picture Long Beach without the Queen Mary.

A few people have been doing just that in recent years as the venerable luxury liner, parked at a downtown pier for 27 years, sucked up city funds like a vacuum cleaner.

But now, with the ship and adjacent facilities about to break even as a popular entertainment center, the city has approved a long-term lease with the Queen Mary’s managers, removing a lot of doubts about the ship’s future.

“It’s really a go now,” said Vice Mayor Douglas Drummond. “It’s going to be permanent.”

The 20-year lease, said Joseph F. Prevratil, head of the foundation that runs the complex, allows managers to get the long-term financing needed to develop attractions and make improvements, such as adding a maritime museum.

Last year, the ship lost $500,000, but this year it expects to turn a profit, said Prevratil, who took it over in 1993 after the Walt Disney Co. gave it up.

Prevratil wants to add shops and restaurants along the waterfront next to the ship and to turn the dome, which housed the Spruce Goose until 1992, into a special events center, with country-Western shows on the weekends. Under terms of the lease, the city will get $25,000 a month in rent or a percentage of the profits, whichever is greater.

The ship now attracts about 1 million people a year.