The development of container shipping with the tendency towards increasingly large vessels plays a decisive role in global trade. New container terminals and deep water ports have been and will continue to be built, existing mooring areas are expanded and handling facilities are being modernised and increasing in numbers. The capability and capacities of ports are continuing to increase, while loading and unloading times of vessels are reduced. Ports worldwide face the challenge of continuous development, constantly requiring new, less expensive but more efficient and more reliable transport solutions and handling facilities. This is exactly the point where the competency of consulting engineering companies such as INROS LACKNER is needed: national and international clients are advised in all areas ranging from port logistics to port development planning, precise port design including any associated infrastructure and supra-structure, and eventually, construction supervision during execution. Since the company’s foundation nearly 75 years ago, various large international port construction projects are linked with the name of INROS LACKNER. Port around the globe pose very different challenges for planners and designers – the differences between planning for Africa, Asia and Europe are significant and cannot only be based on the specific needs of calling vessels, the available handling and transport facilities, the usual construction processes and materials or climatic conditions. Port authorities and terminal operators too favour different standards in different regions. There can be no such thing as a port ‘off the rack’; each port is unique, with optimum adaptation to local conditions and requirements if thoroughly planned: the result of good engineering performance. The following examples of recent projects illustrate this point and highlight the importance of good design to maximise performance and achieve ‘fit for purpose’ design.
New container terminal in Lomé, Togo
Ideas for Africa’s first deep water port at Lomé (Togo) were initiated in 1960. The country’s difficult financial situation necessitated a development to be planned in stages. In the first construction stage, a 1,720-meter long wave breaker was built, as well as a 400m-long jetty in the east (in the area of the subsequently built counter-jetty). Furthermore, a 340m-long and 70m-wide general cargo pier on pile foundation was also included. Open air storage facilities and large transit sheds were also established. An 8km-long connection feeder track to the railroad network in the interior, access roads to the existing road network as well as facilities for electric power and water supply, and navigation lights for the port completed the first stage of development. Planning and implementation were completed speedily at that time, however not under the same pressure experienced in comparable projects nowadays. The deep water port was commissioned in 1968, after a four-year construction period. By 1976, cargo handling had risen from 100,000t to 587,000t. The foreign trade balance of Togo, too, continued its positive development, and an appropriate expansion of the port facilities was projected in cooperation with INROS LACKNER, who operated a branch office at Lomé. The expansion of the quay facilities implemented between 1972 and 1980 comprised the construction of six large warehouses for the export of cotton, coffee and cocoa, as well as a silo for approximately 70,000t cement clinker including the related conveyor systems. Due to the large growth rates in general cargo and container handling, planning for a second mole, a finger pier with a length of approximately 200m and a width of 140m as well as two mooring areas with water depths of 11m and 12m, respectively, was initiated in 1980. Each year, around 300,000 containers are handled. The port of Lomé has hence developed into an important transit port for the countries of the Sahelian zone – Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali. The (natural) water depth of 15m in the feeder canal and 12m to 14m in the port basin as well as the very low sand sediment rates which keep dredging costs to a minimum are of great benefit. The master plan drawn up in 2006 shows that the Port of Lomé still has huge potential for expansion. Small wonder therefore that terminal operators meanwhile have picked up the idea of expanding the port as a container hub. Expansion plans are almost always preceded by hydraulic investigations such as analyses of sedimentation in the port basin and the access canal or of the impact of waves. In addition, the traffic flows in the port and the seaport area are examined and micro and macro-economic analyses are carried out. Studies on environmental impact assessment (mostly based on World Bank standards) as are also common in Germany have been part of such projects as a matter of course for several years.
Baltic Sea transport plans
Baltic Sea transport represents an enormous growth market in quite a different region and on quite a different level. Russia and Germany have had continuous and in-depth relationships in the transport and logistics sector for many years. The percentage of cargo for Russia handled through the ports in the Eastern Baltic Sea region amounts to between 80 and 90%. Additional potential within the region may result from transit from and to Belarus, in particular since the country has opened itself to market economy. Apart from the traditional seaports of St Petersburg, Vybog/ Vysotsk, Lomonossow and Kaliningrad, new ports and port facilities have been established along the Russian Baltic Sea coast. Plans which were well criticised in the early 1990’s have become reality – and expansion is still going on. At present, INROS LACKNER acts as consultant for large projects at St.Petersburg and Lomonossow. The decisive factor for the company to be included in a Russian consortium for establishing a railway and RoRo ferry service from Ust-Luga and Baltiysk to Sassnitz/ Mukran and other German Baltic Sea ports was the experience from numerous projects in ferry terminal planning (Baltic Sea) and the company’s special knowledge in the field of mobile ramps. Apart from RoRo goods, two different types of ferries, Mukran-103 and Rider, also handle railway services at the same ferry bridge system, which represents a novelty in ferry bridge construction. The ferry bridges both at Ust-Luga and at Baltiysk have been designed as 45m long steel structure types with tracks, with their operating and structural principles having been optimised on the basis of the railway ferry bridge facilities built at Mukran (Germany) and Klaipeda (Lithuania) in the early 1980’s. Each ferry bridge system consists of a hoist gantry with rope-guided counter-weight system and electro-hydraulic drive mechanism (hoisting capacity of main cylinder: 3,200 kN), welded steel bridge with steel runway and mastic asphalt pavement. A two-track railway service and multi-lane RoRo service was established. The facility is supplemented by a track switch system on the ferry bridge for possible loading and unloading from eight ship-side tracks. In order to ensure an adjustment between ship and bridge accurate to the millimeter, three hydraulic displacement fenders for transverse positioning and two hydraulic displacement units for longitudinal positioning have been provided.
Goods traffic centre at Port of Karachi
In late 2006, INROS LACKNER, together with a local company, was commissioned with the design for a new, tri-modal goods traffic centre, called “Cargo Village”, at the port of Karachi. This represented the response by Karachi Port Trust (KPT) to the increasing handling volume at the port, which is still to rise in course of the construction of a deep water port for container vessels of the latest generation. Apart from this, urgently required industrial and commercial areas will be provided for the rapidly growing economy in Pakistan and the metropolis of Karachi. The 600ha site is located in the tide-affected area of the Western Backwaters within the port laguna of Karac
hi and will completely be filled up. For this purpose, around 24 million m³ of soil will have to be moved, 10km of shoreline stabilisation as well as a 360m long multi-purpose quay for deep-draught vessels must be established, and the feeder sea must be dredged. Apart from the infrastructure development including roads, water and power supply, waste water and surface water drainage, planning comprises the connection of the access roads with up to six lanes to the general road network and a multi-track railway system. In order to prevent the imminent traffic breakdown, a contract (this time in joint venture) for a new bypass road was launched at the same time. In the future, the city will be bypassed on the seaside via a high bridge across the port access canal (main span 470m, clear passage height 65m) and several kilometers of foreshore bridges. The award of the planning contracts for rehabilitation and modernisation of a shipyard in the port of Karachi in the second half of 2007 reflects the economy’s short response time to improved framework conditions. Nowadays Pakistan is heavily affected by the economic crisis and part of the projects have been cancelled or postponed.
New terminal in Vietnam
In South-East Asian states, too, port economy is booming, even during the financial crisis; existing ports are being expanded, and new terminals are springing up like mushrooms. While INROS LACKNER has previously focused on building construction in Vietnam – for instance with the new construction of the National Convention Centre at Hanoi (structural framework planning, technical equipment, landscaping) and the new assembly hall in Hanoi, the company was recently commissioned with the design for a large container terminal in the Cai Mep area south of Ho Chi Minh city. It is planned that a large area of reclaimed land will be used to handle 1 million TEU from 2011. Three access bridges lead to the berths where water depth of more than 14m allows the loading and unloading of the latest generation of container vessels.