16
There’s just too much choice on Irish Sea
“Too much ro-ro capacity has been thrown on to the Irish Sea and a reduction is needed,” a respected analyst tells FBJ. “DFDS declared the Irish Sea ‘a major problem’ when it made its bid for Norfolkline.” The turmoil is probably
greatest on the southern corridor, both from Ireland to Wales and direct to the continent. Fastnet Line’s new Cork-Swansea service, which belatedly began operating in early March, is serving a market with “little freight appeal” and its vessel, the Julia, has limited deck space, the analyst comments. The vessel has capacity
for 40 lorries, and will sail six nights a week, with additional sailings in summer. “The previous people gave up this route in 2007 at the peak of the market. And whereas you used to face a slow drive on winding roads, now we have fast motorway connections from Cork to Rosslare and Waterford to Dublin,” he says. Frank Nieuwenhuys, Stena
Line’s freight commercial manager for the UK and Ireland, says of the southern corridor: “We’ve seen volumes really pegged back — well over 20% last year. The traditional eastbound export business has waned,
probably a sign of a Euro- based economy struggling to come to terms with a weak Pound. It’s difficult to see much evidence of improvement.” Irish Ferries was hit as
it prepared to re-start its seasonal Rosslare-Cherbourg service in February when a fire broke out in the generator room of the Oscar Wilde just after it departed from the Falmouth shipyard following its annual overhaul. The crew put the fire out but the vessel was out of service for six weeks while electrical damage was repaired. LD Lines is also out of
Rosslare, having effectively quit the Irish market. It could not sustain its three services a week from Cherbourg and has chartered its vessel, Norman Voyager, to Celtic Link, enabling Celtic to lay up its own Diplomat. Celtic Link is still maintaining Ireland’’s main ro ro service to France and the continent, though Cobelfret has also pulled out of Rosslare. The central corridor has
seen plenty of action, with all-freight operator Seatruck Ferries adding the Clipper Pennant to the Dublin- Liverpool route. She offers double the capacity of the vessel she replaced, as well as increased speed.
MD Alistair Eagles says:
“It is fantastic to finally have all four of our new vessels in service. We now have the youngest fleet on the Irish Sea. We were capacity constrained on the Dublin route and our volumes are growing as more Irish Sea traffic switches to our unaccompanied freight-only model, even though the overall market numbers are still negative.” Stena Line reduced
its high-speed sailings between Holyhead and Dun Laoghaire in favour of extra conventional capacity into Dublin. “We had to work on a
more cost-efficient model on the central corridor, to take us forward in the new economic order,” Nieuwenhuys says. “Dublin and the surrounding areas are a consumer market that needs to see stock replenished, but activity is low compared with what we’ve been used to.” Nor thern I reland for 49%
accounted
of Irish Sea traffic last year, up 2% from 2007. Lower VAT than the Republic, and Northern Ireland’s freedom from the effects of the strong Euro has helped the northern corridor perform
continued over
IRELANd
ISSUE 1 2010
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36