AHC: Keep Ocean Liners in Service Longer

I briefly mentioned the possibility of a longer life for the ocean liner as transportation in the thread about a delayed jet age; I asked whether the delay of the start of the jet age (meaning no commercial jet air travel until a later time).

What could keep the ocean liner longer in service as a major (if not the main) transoceanic means of travel?

It is said that once jet airliners began to fly transatlantic in the late 1950s, it brought down airfares significantly so more people could travel (granted, flying was still expensive in the early jet airliner age, before the 747 made it possible to fly more people in one plane more cost effectively). Thus the jet plane is said to be the ocean liner killer. However even without the jet airliner, could the existing propliners (or even bigger flying boats, as once proposed) still have sounded the death knell, eventually, for the ship?

Could the ocean liner have evolved in terms of speed (ie, like the SS United States, or even proposals for bulbous submarine-looking streamlined ships) as well as evolved in terms of airliner-style class stratification (ie, have a budget "economy" class vs. premium classes, with relevant differences in service) to cover a wide range of travel budgets? Like the airlines have done in recent times, could ocean liner companies have gone to the nickel-and-dime (a la carte) pricing model, where the fare covered just the cabin and basic meals, and everything else cost extra?

What would "modern" ocean liners (post 1960s) have been like (other than Cunard's QE2)? Would there still be (much smaller) fleets, or would the ocean liner still evolve into a tiny niche experience? (IOTL, there is only one true ocean liner in existence today--Cunard's flagship Queen Mary 2, which replaced QE2 in 2008.)
 
What would "modern" ocean liners (post 1960s) have been like (other than Cunard's QE2)? Would there still be (much smaller) fleets, or would the ocean liner still evolve into a tiny niche experience? (IOTL, there is only one true ocean liner in existence today--Cunard's flagship Queen Mary 2, which replaced QE2 in 2008.)
Arguably, there are two - there isn't much distinction between a ferry and an ocean liner. The ferry between Iceland and Denmark, the MS Norröna, could be considered an ocean liner considering the length of her voyage.

The overheads of ocean liners are such that they can't compete with airliners - the ship has to provide overnight accommodation for a full week, five days at the absolute minimum. That's hugely expensive. If you want to keep them going, you need to keep transoceanic air travel from becoming widely available.
 
The overheads of ocean liners are such that they can't compete with airliners - the ship has to provide overnight accommodation for a full week, five days at the absolute minimum. That's hugely expensive. If you want to keep them going, you need to keep transoceanic air travel from becoming widely available.

Either that or you need the shipping lines to see the writing on wall and adapt to cruising vs crossing a lot sooner. You might have to butterfly the Depression and World War II for that to happen though. That's a pretty tall order, however.
 
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Many of the lines did do cruising. Even the SS United States and the France did cruising. The United States lines wanted to convert the tourist class to add private bathrooms. The maritime commission turned it down. The United States lines wanted to do more cruising. Again were turned down.
The US lines wanted to reduce staffing to help reduce costs. The unions refused. Many of the last couple of years operations were canceled due to strikes. The same happened with the French Line. The last year the United States ran, If someone wanted a hamburger from room service at midnight. It cost the line $20. Even with most of the us flagged ships being withdrawn from service, unions kept refusing to co operate.

I always thought if the unions and government and the line owners all owned parts of the company that the ships could of run longer.Maybe a quasi government operation like Amtrak.
Of course could be wrong but that is what I think.
 
speaking of which, Crystal Cruises announced plans today to spend $700 million on the SS United States ... just announced that today

which kind of makes me misty eyed
 
Or this technology can be developed better.

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