Portal partners
Container terminal in Świnoujście with the heart of universal hub
Author:Mariusz Dasiewicz
A deep-water container terminal will be part of the terminal complex, along with a LNG terminal and a universal terminal that will take over the functions of the current internal port in Świnoujście. The external port complex, located close to the Danish Straits and on the axis of the transport corridors Baltic-Adriatic-Mediterranean Sea, connecting Central and Eastern Europe to Scandinavia, will become a nodal port, a transit gate for the entire hinterland along these transport routes.
The terminal located in the external port will allow to receive the largest container ships that can enter the Baltic. The infrastructure will provide service to two large oceanic units and several smaller feeder ships. And already implemented for billions of PLN, powerful infrastructure investments will improve the logistics and transport chain, strengthening the basic functions of the container terminal and the entire port complex.
Railway, roads, waterways
An efficient logistics-transport chain requires intermodal infrastructure, rail connections, road connections and upgraded water tracks.
For infrastructure providing access to the deep-water terminal from the sea side, the Board of Maritime Ports Szczecin and Świnoujście received almost 330 million PLN from the Ministry of Finance. The Resort has just issued bonds for investments in the construction of external ports. This amount will increase the capital of ZMPSiŚ.
Most infrastructure investments are under way. PKP Polish Railway Lines invested PLN 1.5 billion in the railway network in both ports. By mid-2022, they will modernize nearly 100 km of tracks and almost 84 km of traction networks, replace nearly 300 turnouts, rebuild several passes, install state-of-the-art control devices, etc.
PKP PLK will also modernise the so-called "Nadodrzanka" (CE 59), the railway connection between Szczecin and Świnoujście and Dolny Śląski, providing the speed of freight warehouses up to 120 km/h.
In turn, the General Directorate of National Roads and Motorways announces that by 2024 we will reach the border with the Czech Republic by the express road S3. GDDKiA began to implement one of the last missing stages of this road, from Troszyn to Świnoujście.
The depth of the Świnoujście-Szczecin water track is of great importance for the network of connections, but also for greater integration of the port team. The investment, which will absorb over PLN 1.4 billion, will also be completed in 2022. Due to the modernization of the ZMPSiŚ track adapts the Kashubian Basin and Dębicki Canal in Szczecin to new parameters. These investments will consume around PLN 700 million.
Let us add the construction of an intermodal ferry terminal in Świnoujście, which is part of the maritime highway connecting to Swedish ports Trelleborg and Ystad. Next year this terminal will be ready for new functions related to intermodal transport and reception at the upgraded wharf ferryup to 270 m long.
Obvious Hub Functions
The concept of an external port with a container and universal terminal and a gas port – fits into a new vision of the perception of Świnoujście by the Board of Maritime Ports Szczecin and Świnoujście.
– We no longer look at the Świnoujście through the prism of the internal mass port and ferry base in the estuary of the Świna – explains Krzysztof Urbaś, President of ZMPSiŚ. – Time to redesign the internal and external ports.
The External Port will create these three terminals and the universal terminal (to be built on a prix, east of the container) will take over the functions of the internal port. The hub functions in this external port complex fit naturally. The deep-water container terminal will allow to change the container handling model in the Szczecin – Świnoujście port team. From a feeder system where only containers previously transhipped at one of the ports of the North Sea from ocean services to smaller haulage ships are served, we can become a base port where ocean ships reach in direct intercontinental relations and where some of the containers taken off ocean vessels are further transhipped to the docks serving the Baltic Sea basin.
In this vision, too, most areas of the internal port change their existing functions – there are to be facilities for containers, logistics centres, warehouse parks, distribution companies, etc. – activities that will not be burdensome for the spa area of Świnoujście.
Offers may be submitted until 28 January 2021
The procedure is ongoing to identify the investor and the downstream operator of the deep water container terminal. Interested parties may submit tenders by 28 January 2021.
Documents to be downloaded: http://www.port.specin.pl/en/offer/glandohydrate-terminal-container/procedure/
Source: ZMPSIŚ
