Transport accessibility of the Port of Szczecin for containerized cargo

What is transport accessibility?

    Seaports are part of the spatial layout of a given country’s communication network, alongside roads and other transport hubs. The port itself is a transport hub where lines of maritime, land, river, and pipeline transport converge. Sometimes air transport is also included. The most important function fulfilled by ports is the transport function, which consists of two activities: cargo movement and its transshipment (loading, unloading, storage, and arrangement, e.g., in a warehouse or means of transport). The scale and significance of the transport function depend on the number of communication routes converging in the port, as well as the technical level and the manner in which transport means are utilized. The movement of cargo involves changing the location of the cargo using so-called short-distance transport equipment, transshipment devices, and mechanized equipment.

One of the main aspects influencing the competitiveness of seaports is transport accessibility. By this term, we understand a set of factors influencing the competitiveness of ports and their operational performance. These factors can include: geographical, historical, political, economic, etc. This set of factors determines the division of cargo mass gravitating toward a specific port. The transport accessibility of Polish seaports can be divided into technological accessibility and economic accessibility. We speak of technological transport accessibility when a seaport is able, from the point of view of its technical and technological capacity, to transship every type and every volume of cargo mass and to service every means of transport. It is determined by, among other things: approach channel parameters, information about turning basins, depths of port basins and channels, types and technical equipment of quays, number and area of storage yards, access to transport routes, etc. Economic accessibility, on the other hand, means the existence of such a level of transport costs (broadly understood as all costs associated with the movement of cargo from the place of dispatch to the place of receipt), as well as such a level of handling time, that cargo and means of transport can bear. The economic accessibility of a port is manifested through the port’s active investment activity and favorable tariff rates concerning both port and land handling. These tariffs include costs such as: mooring, laytime, pilotage, tugboat, bunker, water intake, use of transshipment equipment, transported cargo means, and others.

From the point of view of today’s trends in cargo transport by containers, an essential role is played by transport accessibility for containerized cargo. To smaller ports of regional significance, containers are delivered by smaller vessels that take over containers from large container ships in major ports adapted to receive and handle such units. Technological accessibility also includes land roads by which containers are transported in import or export. Hence, many ports are still modernizing and improving their superstructure, creating better access to their container terminals for both road and rail transport. In the case of many ports, transport accessibility is also determined by inland navigation, which should also be adapted from a technological point of view for the transport of containers from the port hinterland. Containers are cargo whose transshipment, depending on the technological advancement of port quays, takes place very quickly with low expenditures, so tariff fees are not too high here. An efficient customs clearance of containers in transit, which takes place inland, also plays an important role here.

Container transshipment in the port of Szczecin
Container transshipment in the port of Szczecin takes place in the Temporary Container Base, located on the Czech and Slovak quays on the Ewa Peninsula, along the western bank of the Dębicki Canal. This terminal has two warehouses with an area of 14,700 thousand sq m. The area of the Temporary Container Base is approx. 2.5 ha, while the storage area is 2,000 TEU simultaneously on an area of up to 2.1 ha. This area is equipped with 72 refrigerated container connection points. The length of the quay for transshipment in the lo-lo relation (load-on, load-off) is 360 m, the maximum ship draft is 9.15 m and is equal to the permissible draft in the port of Szczecin. This quay is also equipped with a ro-ro ramp (roll-on, roll-off).

The largest transshipments (in TEU) at the Temporary Container Base were recorded in 2000, when nearly 22 thousand TEU with a total weight of 192 thousand tons were transshipped. The transshipment capabilities of the Temporary Container Base are estimated at approx. 30-35 thousand TEU annually, which averages 500 TEU per day (excluding Sundays). The current base is to be replaced in the future by a modern container terminal, which will be built on the other side of the Dębicki Canal. Its transshipment capabilities are planned at approx. 50 thousand TEU.

The containers transshipped in the TCB are 10′, 20′, 25′ and 40′ containers. From 1991 to 2003, the overwhelming majority were 20′ containers – 67,151 pieces, which accounts for nearly 48.88% of all serviced containers. In second position are 40′ containers – 56,297 pieces (approx. 40.98%), 10′ containers – 13,196 pieces (9.61%), and 25′ containers, of which there were the fewest – 738 pieces (0.53%). The percentage share of individual container groups in TCB transshipments is graphically shown in chart 1.

 

Based on the transshipment volumes described in the chart during the examined period, the following trends can be distinguished:

• in the years 1991-1997 there was a strongly downward trend, during this period the volume of container transshipment expressed in TEU decreased by as much as 9,637 units. The largest decrease in transshipment volume occurred between 1996 and 1997 and amounted to 7,422 TEU.
• in the second period, i.e., in the years 1997-2000, an upward trend occurred. During this period, an increase in volume of as much as 15,945 TEU was recorded. The highest transshipment value was recorded in 2000, when 21,865 TEU were transshipped.
• the last period, i.e., the years 2000 – 2003, is a period in which transshipment took place at a constant level with a slight increase in the years 2001 – 2002. The last year ended with a transshipment of 21,628 TEU.

Descriptive and comparative analysis of the transport accessibility of the port of Szczecin for containerized cargo

In the analysis of the transport accessibility of the port of Szczecin against the background of selected Baltic ports, ports with the largest share in Szczecin’s Baltic foreland, such as Lübeck, Klaipėda, or Saint Petersburg, will be characterized. These are ports with which the Szczecin and Świnoujście port authority has established cooperation in joint cargo transport. The port of Gdynia will also be analyzed as a port competitive in terms of acquiring a hinterland and a port that has a developed and significant container base.

Port of Lübeck (Germany)

The port of Lübeck is the largest container port on the Baltic Sea. It has four terminals adapted for containerized cargo transshipment. In 2003, a new terminal was opened, where a new shipping line between Lübeck and Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg was launched. The new terminal is part of the Baltic Bridge – a transport venture that also includes a motorway and shuttle rail connections between Hamburg and Lübeck. The initiators of this project intend to ensure that the “bridge” ultimately passes approx. 2,100 to 800 thousand TEU annually between Hamburg and Baltic Sea ports. Transshipments in the port will take place directly, in the railcar – ship relation, bypassing storage yards. The main component of the system is a container train that runs several times a day between Hamburg and Lübeck. The terminal has a 320 m long quay, led by 16 railway tracks, two tracks for cranes spaced at a width of 80 m. The transshipment of containers from train to ship is computer-controlled.  

The port of Lübeck has connections to the A-1/A-20 motorways, on which about 350 containers are transported daily, a rail terminal adapted for combined transport, as well as access to European inland waters via the Elbe-Lübeck Canal. Lübeck also has an airport, for which the alternative is the port of Hamburg, an hour’s drive away.

To date, Lübeck’s road transport accounts for nearly 82% of all transport, followed by rail transport – 14% and inland transport – 4%. The port of Lübeck is the furthest south-west port on the Baltic Sea, it constitutes the fastest connection of this water body with Germany and Western Europe. This port has 130 regular connections per week with countries such as: Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Russia.