Adriatic Ports in Mega-Ship Move

Italian port officials have called for Northern Adriatic ports to pool their resources together to develop an offshore terminal that would enable ports in the region to handle the new era of mega-ships, according to the Journal of Commerce.

The offshore solution was proposed by Paolo Costa, President of the Venice Port Authority, as a solution to handling larger ships, since ports in the Adriatic are currently only capable of handling as much as 7,600 TEU ships.

As part of a collective effort, port facilities in regions such as Chiogga and Venice would not have to be expanded separately.

Costa said: “The offshore terminal model offers one call for mega-vessels as compared with the traditional model of multi-call of smaller vessels feeding the mega-ship.”

Ports globally are feeling the pressures that the larger mega-ships are putting on their operations, with implications such as increased peaks and dwell times affecting port operations.

Read a Technical Paper by Drewry on the effects of mega-ships and alliances

Ports in the US are currently working to build on infrastructure to handle the larger ships and spending billions on upgrades as they prepare for the opening of the expanded Panama Canal.

The Port of Oakland recently announced that it is raising four massive gantry cranes 7.9 metres higher in order to facilitate larger containerships as it looks to compete for a greater share of the traffic handled further down the California coast at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Despite the ongoing works in the US, the ships are still dwarfed by the vessels that traverse the Asia-Europe route.