Ports feature, Irish Independent, Friday 11 March 2005

Ireland's ports in an integrated system

Using the nation's ports as part of a transport system is the way forward, writes Cian Molloy

As an island nation, Ireland's commercial ports are vital to the country's economy given that they are responsible for 99pc of the volume of our international trade. Therefore it is surprising how poorly our national transport infrastructure links up with our ports. Indeed, when it comes to port-connected transport it is a tale of two system: road connections are steadily improving, but rail connections are in major decline.

According to Jimmy Quinn, communications director with the Irish Road Hauliers Association, when it comes to providing adequate road infrastructure, "it is a case of 'a lot done, a lot more to do'. The road linking Greenore to the M1 at Dundalk, for example, is one of the best regional roads in the country", he says. "But slightly further down the east coast, trucks linking up with Drogheda Port have to pass through the town. The connection between Limerick and Foynes is improving bit by bit, as is the N11 to Rosslare. Gradually, things are improving but we are coming from very far behind. Most of the improvements have been focused on Dublin, which is only right as that is where the bulk of activity is. However, if you are using one of the regional ports, you may feel as though you have the worst problems in the world, taking fish from Dingle, Killybegs of Dungloe involves a rough hike if you are taking a maximum weight articulated lorry over the hills and mountains."

Michael Murphy, general manager of Rosslare-Europort, says road improvements now mean that the south-eastern port is less than four hours journey from anywhere in Ireland. As a result, he says, "Hauliers are now choosing Rosslare as their route to the UK and the Continent as a way of avoiding the congestion in Dublin City. Things will further improve when work on the Gorey bypass, which starts this year, is completed and that will be followed by the bypasses of Enniscorthy and New Ross."
Given the fact that Rosslare Europort is the only port in Ireland owned by Iarnród Éireann, it is ironic perhaps that it is not a rail freight port. Indeed the only two rail freight ports surviving are Dublin and Waterford, with the future of Waterford's rail freight hanging by a thread. In 2003, Iarnród Éireann proposed ending freight services to Waterford at the same time as they ended rail freight services to Belfast, Galway and Dundalk.

The closure of these services is lamentable, says John Whelan, CEO of the Irish Exporters Association. He points out that the decision to end freight services to Dundalk and the proposal to end freight services to Waterford in 2003 came almost immediately after both ports had been declated "gateways" in the national spatial strategy. "One freight train takes 50 40-foot heavy good vehicles off the road, which results in a whole load of savings to the economy in the form of reduced road congestion, pollution and road accidents. It's reckoned that an increase of only 10pc in road traffic volumes can lead to a major increase in congestion at bottlenecks, so taking just a small number of vehicles off the road has major benefits. The decline in rail freight in Ireland is reckoned to have an environmental cost of €36m a year. We should be investing in rail and investigating the possibility of public private partnerships on the rail network, as they have done in the UK where rail freight traffic is increasing, as a result of major investment by the private sector", he says. "At present only 3pc of freight in Ireland is carried by rail - 10 years ago 10pc of freight was carried by rail."

At Shannon Foynes, where there are plans to develop the port as an international transhipment and logistics, the fact that the Foynes rail link isn't in use is a major cause of irritation to the port company, which has long been calling for the link to be ugraded to regularly carry freight trains. Iarnród Éireann says that it doesn't make any economic sense to upgrade the Foynes rail link at present, but Whelan claims "Iarnród Éireann is using crazy numbers, off the top of its head, about what it would take to open the line up properly. The one thing that can only be said in its favour is that Iarnród Éireann hasn't sold the land on which the tack runs or knocked down the bridges along the route, so that the link could be upgraded at little cost compared to the building of a completely new rail route."

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Gateways to the world

The importance of ports to the grand scale of import and export trade cannot be overemphasised. John Hearne reports

Almost everything in your possession that was made outside Ireland arrived here by sea. In 2003, roughly €130bn worth of goods entered or exited the country at Ireland's ports, compared to an estimated €7-10bn through the airports. In volume terms, Irish ports handle fully 99pc of our internationally traded goods.

As such, the ports of Cork, Drogheda, Dundalk, Dublin, Dun Laoghaire, Shannon Foyns, Galway, New Ross, Waterford and Wicklow are an integral, essential part of the economic success story that we've become in the past decade. This isn't always recognised. The high-level review of the ports published two years ago said that there "has been an apparent failure by the State to recognise the key role ports play in the economic life of Ireland. Ports are a key element of the integrated transport chain." Moreover, independent studies have shown just how important a port can be in the economic life of the hinterland.

A 2002 study from University College Cork found that the total annual contribution of all activities in the port of Cork to the Irish economy amounted to €230m and 2,604 full-time equivalent jobs. The total value of Cork's export trade was calculated at €25.2bm, associated with 97,600 full-time equivalent jobs, while the value of import trade was calculated at €9.6bn, linked to 50,000 full-time equivalent jobs. Not bad by anyone's reckoning.

Rising demand for space close to urban centres, impending capacity constraints and finding the funding to rectify those constraints represent the biggest challenges to the port sector in the years ahead. All of the major ports are currently putting major expansion plans in place. Martin Morrissey, commercial manager with Shannon Foynes Port Company, says that they're looking at the possibility of building a transhipment facility in the Shannon estuary. He explains that increased international traffic between Asia and Europe, and Europe and the US, is putting serious pressure on the large European ports like Rotterdam and Hamburg.

In addition, economies of scale mean ships are getting bigger, but because the big harbours lie at the heart of congested hubs, they have very little room to grow to accommodate these larger vessels. A transhipment facility in the Shannon estuary could, however, provide a berth for these huge ships whose cargoes could then be broken down and dispatched to their ultimate destinations.

"This has the potential to put Ireland on the map in a way that hasn't been done before", says Morrissey. "With the current size of the vessels, they come in from Asia or the US and they stop at maybe Rotterdam, Le Havre and Hamburg, then come around to the UK ports of Southampton or Felixstowe and back out again. So they spend the bones of a week sailing around Europe. As these vessels get bigger, it's much more economical for them to offload all their cargo for Europe at one point."

In Cork, marketing executive of the port company, Tony O'Leary, explains that the increased size of vessels will mean the current container terminal at Tivoli will have to be relocated at some point in the not too distant future. Because it lies directly above a section of the Jack Lynch Tunnel, there is a limit to how deep the port can be dredged.

In the longer term, the city quays terminal, which currently handles in the region of 1.2 million tons of cargo annually, will also be moved downstream to create development space close to the city centre. The port company has begun looking for suitable locations for a new container terminal that can both overcome the limitations of these two terminals and meet the capacity requirements of the economy in the future.

Drogheda Port Company, meanwhile, is looking at the development of a deepwater port and logistics centre at Bremore. The proposed facility will be of sufficient size to handle cargoes well in excess of those currently handled at Dublin Port, is already rail linked and lies only 20 minutes from Dublin on the M1.

Chief executive of the port company, Paul Fleming, says this new facility will be uniquely positioned. It's between Dublin and Belfast and that economic corridor is going to grow in importance in terms of its development, but in relation to Dublin itself, it's just outside the M50 ring and you've 20 minutes to get on to it, so from an access point of view, you can put considerable tonnage through the facility without impacting on every-day life, particularly within the city", he says.