Page 26: of Maritime Logistics Professional Magazine (Sep/Oct 2018)

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PORT LOGISTICS

Custom-size: the truck-borne containers at the heart of short-sea shipping’s surge

Credit: Unifeeder the Humber (River area).”

P3 potential

Already, the South Humber Industrial Programme, or SHIP, has

The new Unifeeder service between the UK and Poland will make the most of 20, 40 and 45-foot containers at the heart of allotted GBP 26 million of investment to ready land and build the short-sea shipping and its “door-to-door” deliveries. With the Humber Link Road between the ports of Grimsby and Imming-

UK anxious to secure trade ahead of Brexit, Unifeeder’s service ham. By 2020, however, councillors are reportedly hoping to see to Immingham has authorities anxious to provide as much road the investments in ports “pay for themselves” with upwards of and rail transport as needed to make short-sea and feeder routes GPB 90 million in income over 20 years. work. A wealth of P3, coastal-infrastructure projects are being

Trucks-in, Trucks-out screened, with much money allotted quickly to kick things off.

Despite the roads, there’s some evidence that trucking compa-

The Immingham port authority, Associated British Ports and the Lincolnshire Region have published documents showing that nies of over 1,000 tractor-trailers (lorries) have pulled out of the “further container handling requires very little (site) alteration, UK market for a long list of reasons that include steep fnes for consisting as it does of mainly of open storage.” Better surfacing, being associated with stowaway migrants and driver shortages that make growth impossible. Then there’s short-sea shipping, new fencing, lighting and signage but no repurposing of infra- structure is what ABP suggested would be need at Immingham to the success of which has meant fewer trucks crossing the English

Channel by ferry or through the Eurotunnel. bring in another line or just more of Unifeeder.

Wiese cautions, however, that it takes more than cranes to gen- erate container traffc.

Terminal Growth “The UK is one of Poland’s biggest trading partners. The number

But three new rubber-tired gantries and “smaller pieces of mo- bile plant and equipment” are said to constitute the better part of loads is growing each year – huge growth – in that direction. of a “major overhaul” (including demolitions) planned to yield a From our side, we simply ship out of Gdynia, as we’re a different multiplicity of effects for terminal operators at Immingham, the company than the competition. Offering feeder and short-sea allows us to offer customers a more comprehensive network. We can create

UK’s largest port by tonnage, where 10 percent of the UK’s sea- lines where they want them, with feeder legs all over Europe.” borne trade is handled.

In a letter to regional authorities responsible for funding Im- mingham, an ABP man noted for the public that “the short-sea container market has performed well beyond our expectations.”

William Stoichevski

The Author arrived in Norway in 1999 to lead a media campaign “We have seen a 41 percent growth in volumes of shipping con- for Norwegian green group Bellona. He later served as tainers at our two container terminals in Immingham and Hull. regional feature writer for the Associated Press in Oslo.

Based on this and anticipated future growth we have in the last

In 2003, he left the AP to begin building, overseeing and few months invested GBP 50 million on port service infrastruc- writing for a number of print and electronic energy-industry publications in the Norwegian capital. ture with a view to expanding our offer for container shipping in 26 Maritime Logistics Professional September/October 2018 | |