NORTHEAST\\\


The port on the Tyne is just fine, just fine


The Port of Tyne had a good year in 2011 but now things are set to get even better, says commercial director of logistics, John Tye. One of the Port’s biggest customers, Nissan, has just announced that it is to build a new hatchback car at its nearby Sunderland plant, which will undoubtedly boost inbound and outbound volumes through the port. Planned improvements to the


container terminal including a £6 million Liebherr Panamax gantry crane that will allow larger container vessels and improve efficiency and reliability. The crane is the first phase of


an estimated £10 million injection which includes improved container storage capacity, additional liſting equipment and new IT systems. Important though Nissan is,


it is by no means the port’s only customer. Recent successes include digger manufacturer Komatsu and outdoor clothing manufacturer Barbour. John Tye says: “The recession


has meant that companies are taking a detailed look at their supply chains and challenge the traditional ways of moving things, increasingly


local businesses are looking to use regional ports instead of the southern ones. “Forwarders have also been


challenged to come up with different ways of doing things to improve cost and carbon emissions. And , a lot of shippers are getting fed up with delays on the road to and from Felixstowe and Southampton,


John Tye : Shippers are getting fed up with delays on the road to the South


whereas if you’re using a local port you can plan in a far more efficient and effective manner.” Another growth area for the


Port of Tyne is recycled materials including paper, plastic and metal which helped drive up the number of containers handled at the Port of Tyne in 2011 by 25% and boosted container volumes to a record 71,000teu. “Both imports and exports are


handling solutions from our Tees base


Diverse freight


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performing well for the Port so that they are almost in balance. Only three years ago the export to import ratio was just 20%”, says John Tye. He adds: “The attraction of this to the shipping lines is that they get


Issue 3 2012


39


their equipment turned round quicker, as you can very oſten get a reload for an imported box nearby, so there’s no need to send boxes empty to a depot for storage. And it also cuts out the cost of doing that.” Much of the recycled material


comes from the local area though a proportion originates from as far


afield as Scotland, including Perth, Grangemouth, Kilmarnock and the M8 corridor, and this business is expected to increase. Major service developments at


the Port of Tyne in recent months include Unifeeder’s weekly service to and from Hamburg, Gdynia and the new Russian port of Ust Luga – the service from Tyne is one of the very few available from the UK direct to the Leningrad region gateway. Tyne is also heavily marketing itself in the Baltics and hopes to add services to Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia in the fairly near future. “We think Russia and the Baltics will be the next big thing,” John Tye explains. “Russia, for example, is a huge market and they also make cars and clothing – and Port of Tyne is strategically located on the east coast to service this region.”


North-East by North-West


European logistics solutions specialist P&O Ferrymasters has since last October been offering a direct rail link from its Teesport terminal to Widnes in north-west England. Using the services of train operator Direct Rail Services (DRS), it currently offers three round trips per week but aims to run a daily schedule from the second quarter of this year. Transit time is seven hours, via Crewe. The service runs in conjunction with


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P&O Ferries sailings from Rotterdam and Zeebrugge to Teesport, which is


Ferrymaster’s main hub in the North- East for both Zeebrugge and Rotterdam via P&O Ferries, while Widnes offers a strategic location in the North-west and an ultra-modern container terminal. DRS has made a substantial


investment in specially designed low liner wagons that can carry 9’6” high pallet-wide containers over this section of the UK rail network. P&O Ferrymasters intermodal


director Wim Blomme notes: “We expect to transfer a large proportion of our road movements on this trade lane,


which will produce a significant cut in CO2 emissions.” The rail initiative is supported by the


UK Department for Transport through its Mode Shift Revenue Support (MSRS) scheme. Traffic originates from all over


Europe, including Greece, Italy, Spain to Belgium, France, Germany and Netherlands. So far the train service only caters for ferry related traffic although some trials are being carried out to position UK domestic traffic between the North East and North West.


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