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P&O Ferries is a British company that operates ferries from the United Kingdom to Ireland and Continental Europe (France, Belgium and the Netherlands . These were previously operated at different times as separate subsidiaries of P&O under the names Pandoro Ltd, P&O European Ferries, P&O Portsmouth, P&O North Sea Ferries, P&O Irish Sea and the joint venture P&O Stena Line. ==History== P&O originally established ferry services in the United Kingdom in the late 1960s in the North Sea and the English Channel. In the late 1970s P&O was affected by a reduction in traditional shipping activities which saw the sale of a number of its businesses and assets. This continued into 1985 with the sale of its cross-channel ferry activities to European Ferries, which at the time consisted of services on the Dover–Boulogne and Southampton–Le Havre routes. In January the following year, P&O purchased a 50.01% interest in European Financial Holdings Ltd, which held 20.8% of shares in European Ferries,〔 followed in 1987 with the purchase of the remaining shares of the European Ferries Group whose ferry services were trading as Townsend Thoresen. Following the ''Herald of Free Enterprise'' disaster in March 1987, the operations of Townsend Thoresen were renamed P&O European Ferries on 22 October 1987, with operations from Portsmouth, Felixstowe and Dover.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 work=Companies House Company )〕 Following a consultation with the Competition Commission beginning 28 November 1996,〔 P&O European Ferries split into three separate subsidiaries: P&O Portsmouth, P&O North Sea and the creation of a joint venture between P&O and the Swedish ferry company Stena AB's UK subsidiary Stena Line (UK) Ltd to create P&O Stena Line in Dover.〔 In April 2002, P&O announced its intention to purchase Stena Line's 40% share of the joint venture. The purchase was completed by August, and in October 2002〔 the Portsmouth and North Sea operations were merged with the Dover operations to create P&O Ferries Ltd, jointly managing all services from its head office, Channel House in Dover. In September 2004, P&O Ferries Ltd conducted a business review that concluded with the announcement of closure of several of its long-term Portsmouth-based routes, leaving only the Portsmouth – Bilbao route in operation. These closures were predominantly blamed on the expansion of low-cost airlines and the increasing usage of the Channel Tunnel as a faster alternative to ferry operations. On 15 January 2010, P&O Ferries announced that it would be closing the Portsmouth–Bilbao route by the end of September to coincide with the end of its existing charter for the ''Pride of Bilbao''. This meant the closure of the final route served by P&O Ferries in Portsmouth. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「P&O Ferries」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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