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ROLL-ON/ROLL-OFF
WorldCargo
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It’s a tough road going by sea
A year after P&O European Ferries
announced its pull-out from
Western Channel operations as
of the end of this month and
Louis Dreyfus Lines (LDA), best
known for its Mediterranean
cruise and ferry interests (including
the GLD, its Toulon-
Civitavecchia joint venture with
Grimaldi), will plug the gap.
Portsmouth Commercial
Port and Le Havre port authority
(PAH) have been searching
hard for a replacement to P&O.
Initially Brittany Ferries, perhaps
the obvious candidate, expressed
interest, but in March it withdrew
its candidature.
Starting next month, LDA
will align a large ro-pax ferry, the
1992-built NORMAN SPIRIT, with
capacity for 1850 passengers and
600 cars or 120 lorries.
Only accompanied freight
will be accepted. Initially, LDA
is offering one daily sailing each
way, with departures from Le
Havre at 17.00 hours returning
at 07.30 hours the next morning.
It is hoping to build annual
traffic in due course to 600,000
passengers and 50,000 trucks.
Crossing time has been set
There is speculation that
Cobelfret Ferries is to take over
Simon Group’s port interests.
The Antwerp-based shipping
group has already acquired a 28
per cent stake - 11 per cent stake
in August followed by another
17 per cent this month, through
Montauban SA.
In 2002 Cobelfret agreed a 20
year lease of up to 60 acres of land
at Simon’s Humber Sea Terminal
(HST) on the River Humber, so
already it part-owns its landlord.
Last December the Board of
Simon confirmed that it was in
sale talks with unnamed parties.
Earlier this month, the Board said
that after discussions with the potential
bidder concerning the implication
of its August share purchase,
it “is no longer in discussions
with any party concerning
a possible offer for Simon Group.”
However, the purchase of the
second tranche of shares (from J
O Hambro) appears to have postdated
that announcement, so the
rumours have continued.
Simon’s group turnover for the
six months to 30 June 2005 was
Although the EU’s Marco
Polo programme has attracted
considerable publicity,
there is not as much “steak
in the sandwich” as there ought
to be. Most road-to-sea initiatives
have taken place in the Mediterranean
and a good example is the
GLD - Grimaldi Naples and Louis
Dreyfus Armateurs (LDA) - service
between Toulon and Civitavecchia.
This was set up after the
earlier Toulon-Savona initiative
failed, ostensibly because the distance
was too short and truck fuel
prices were lower than forecast.
Green, white and red
The GLD service is an Italian-flag
operation, which reportedly
New Anglo-services
at 5.5 hours. Support for LDA
will be provided by PAH during
the first year. PAH will also
carry out some modernisation
work in the ferry terminal.
Harwich-IJmuiden
A new ro-pax service is being
started up between Hutchison’s
Harwich International Port
(HIP) and IJmuiden by Nedlines
BV. “Nedlines have signed a fiveyear
agreement with us, which
is excellent news for shippers,
who can now take advantage of
an enhanced range of options
from the port, including the
choice of 57 sailings in both directions
each week,” said HIP’s
COO David Gledhill.
The new service deploys
ENVOY chartered from Finnlines.
It focuses on driver-accompanied
freight and offers a daily
overnight sailing, giving customers
an alternative route next
to the existing ferry operators
on the North Sea and Channel.
Nedlines is a joint venture of
ferry operator Doeksen Transport
Group, financial investor
Schelling Investments and project
initiator Bart Cunnen. ❏
Cobelfret to buy Simon?
£13.208 mill, up 1.8 per cent on
the first half of last year. Ro-ro
revenues rose by 31 per cent from
£4.188 mill to £5.49 mill, due
to the Cobelfret lease at HST that
commenced in October 2004.
Berths 1 and 2 at HST have
been extended, to accommodate
larger Stena vessels due to enter
service next year and larger car
carriers from Korea and Japan.
Simon has also applied for planning
permission to increase the
number of ro-ro berths at HST
from four to six. In January this
year it acquired a 70-acre plot of
land adjacent to HST to underpin
this phase III development.
Negotiations have been ongoing
with a number of lines for the
berth space vacated by Seawheel,
which has been acquired by
Samskip. Simon’s other port operation
is Port Sutton Bridge, located
on The Wash and handling
mainly steel and grain traffic. ❏
● Simon Storage has been sold by
Patron Capital Partners and Fortress
Investment Group to
Canada-based Inter Piepline Fund
for £120 mill (C$260 mill). ❏
means 50 per cent cheaper
crewing costs than using a French
crew. LDA’s new Portsmouth-Le
Havre service (see yellow box) will
also be Italian-flagged.
The GLD service was boosted
by a deal with Gefco covering
southbound transport of new PSA
Peugeot-Citroën automobiles
(WorldCargo News, April 2005,
p31). This should account for
40,000 vehicles/year and reduces
the threshold for breakeven to 60
trailers/sailing. The maximum
trailer intake is 150.
The service is operated with
EUROSTAR VALENCIA and provides
three weekly overnight sailings
each way. Transit time is just 14.5
hours, as the natural “arc” of the
sea route takes miles off the overland
trip. A trucker operating
within the speed limits and taking
compulsory rest time would
take 22 hours on average.
One of the difficulties is that
unaccompanied services do not
appeal to many of the large
number of owner/operators active
More than 25 years experience
with worldwide service
and spare parts net.
in the Italian and French haulage
markets. However, an early and
sizeable supporter of the link is
Transports Gelin, based in Brittany.
The company was quoted as
saying that the tariff of €400
(which includes two meals for the
driver) was less than half the cost
of the equivalent road journey.
This reflects not only fuel savings,
reduced tyre wear, etc but the
avoidance of road tolls in Italy and
Mont Blanc or Fréjus tunnel tolls.
Another Suardiaz
Another recently-established short
sea, ro-ro “hop” is Flota Suardiaz’s
weekly Línea Atlántico service.
Southbound, this calls Vlissingen,
Zeebrugge, Southampton, Santander,
Vigo, Setúbal and Casablanca,
with calls every other week
in the Canaries (Las Palmas and
Tenerife). Northbound the ships
call Setúbal, Vigo and Vlissingen.
Clearly there is plenty of opportunity
for picking and dropping
cargo on the route. Calls at
Gijón are offered on inducement:
BALTICBORG is one of the two new Wagenborg ro-ros deployed in Kappa
Packaging group’s RoRo2Stockholm service
a disappointment for this Spanish
port which has opened a new roro
terminal (WorldCargo News,
April 2005, p23).
Back with headhaul
Ro-ro operators have become
much more adept at marketing
backhaul capacity for third party
general cargo. This is making a
positive contribution to modal
shift, particularly in Nordic flows
where southbound flows are dedicated
to paper product shipments
and ships would normally return
with some waste products for recycling,
but mostly in ballast.
A good recent example is the
Kappa Packaging case in Piteå in
northern Sweden. This is the biggest
kraft liner mill in Europe with
an annual output of more than
700,000 tonnes/year, mostly
shipped out on ro-ros.
Wagenborg has introduced
two, new 10,000 dwt “green” roros,
BALTICBORG and BOTHNIABORG,
for this traffic. Containers, trailers
and uitised timber packs are
loaded on the weatherdeck.
Rolltrailers from the mill are
driven onto the main deck and
tank top and, for optimum stowage,
the cargo is carried sto-ro.
Clear height of the main deck
and the tank top are 5.8m and 5m
News of the world
Further information is given by Mr. Mats Johansson
www.ro-roconstruction.se
• Dramatical cost cut for
stevedoring work
• Faster loading/unloading i.e.
reduction in turnover time.
• Flush deck which can
accommodate any type of
Ro-Ro cargo.
• The minute the tug has
positioned the trailer in its
position it has been secured.
Address:
Indiska Oceanen
S-418 34 Gothenburg, Sweden
Telephone:+46 (0)31-54 90 16
Telefax: +46 (0)31-54 64 30
E-mail: mats.johansson@mcr.se
The Sideloader Specialist
New linkspan installed
Ravestein BV has completed
installation of the new doubledeck
linkspan at the Port of
Dunkirk’s Quai de Ramgate. As
previously reported (WorldCargo
News, April 2005, p31), this is
desgned to cater for the bigger
ro-ro ships which have been introduced
by Norfolk Line.
The twin deck pontoon
has a bridge length of 90m and
the bridge has an 8m wide
centre lane (two-directional)
and two single-direction, 4m
wide side lanes.
The pontoon measures 19m
long by 23.6m wide and 8.8-
10m high. Its freeboard can be
varied by ballasting from 2.6m
to 4.5m. The height of the upper
bridge can be varied hydraulically
between 6.5m and 8.7m.
The SWLs of the bridge and total
linkspan are 220 tonnes and
800 tonnes repsectively. The
linkspan is classed by LRS. ❏
Hammar Maskin AB
SE-517 95 Olsfors, Sweden
Tel: (+46) 33 29 00 00, Fax: (+46) 33 29 00 01
E-mail: hammar@hammarmaskin.se
Internet: www.hammarmaskin.se
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September 2005 33