Distribution trends:
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THE GROWTH of containerization in the past decade represents the most exciting development in transport since sailing ships and horse-drawn vehicles were superseded by a newer technology. All modes of transport are affected by the increasing use of containers and infrastructure investment especially in ports and terminals, must be greatly affected by the future growth of container movements.
Unfortunately for the transport and investment planners, rival modes of sea transport offer a potential threat to the continued development of containerisation as we have seen it grow in the past decade. Despite the obvious benefits of the 20ft x 8ft x 8ft 250 module and the longer versions, any road or rail network that can profitably utilize non-standard boxes offering larger volume than the ISO containers will do so on customer demand.
Container ships
"Conventional" container ships carrying upwards of 2,500 20ft container equivalents are now under construction and these ships will draw too much water for many existing container ports. Hence, such ports will either have to undertake expensive dredging as at Harwich/ Felixstowe — the containers will be offloaded by satellite container ships for "local" distribution. This reflects a rather striking parallel with the likely trend of urban deliveries by small vans, working from peripheral town distribution depots, fed by the largest legally acceptable trunk lorries.
In a thoughtful paper presented to a recent Freight Management conference on "the Cost of Containerization," Mr John Williams, director of the National Materials Handling Centre, noted the development of the MECO and TASK (takes all sizes and kinds) of ships as a development of roll-on/roll-off philosophy. These ships can move containers horizontally on conveyorized decks with vertical movement by lifts. The design could permit vehicles of any size. or any type of container, standard ISO or other, to be carried, with discharge of the box or vehicic through a side-port on to a quayside for handling by comparatively simple equipment. Incidentally, Atlantic Container Li ne'5 "taxi" service across the Nord Atlantic already carries con. tainers and wheeled vehicles ()any size or weight four times week, year round, from South ampton, Liverpool or Greenock.
Some new container ships beini built include provision for adjust ing the dimensions of the "cells' to permit different size container to be carried. It is difficult to see how such elaborate equipment can be kept in smooth working order, but those building and planning the operation of such allpurpose ships must think it scan be done. Because speed of turnround in ports — the original motivation of containerization — is so vital, new types of craneage are being developed to speed up the normal) 2-3 minutes per container "hook-cycle".
Road hauliers will tend to favour any off-loading or loading system at container ports which minimizes the time spent unprofitably in ports, though the decisive influence in encouraging new systems will rest with customers.
John Williams described a study by a multi-national chemical company in the United States, with a number of factories close to the Atlantic considering the movement of containers directly from its factories to container ships along the coastline, using helicopters. Direct deliveries to sites of containers off-loaded from a massive container ship to satellite coastal vessels is another obvious possibility akin to the LASH (Lighter Aboard Ship) concept whereby powered barges, after discharge from the ocean carrier, proceed to estuary sites for delivery or collection.
Visionary schemes
There are visionary schemes to carry containers and other cargo in freight-carrying airships. One recent proposal envisages an airship 400 yards long weighing 35 'tons and able to carry 400 tons at 90 mph for 1,500 miles. The German Democratic Republic wants to combine the airship and aeroplane lifting principles to build the so-called Dolphin Luftschiff. "Propulsion is by flaps and rotating shafts at the stern which gives an undulating wave impulse like the up and down movement of a dolphin". This sounds like an April I joke: who knows?
OCL profits
A conventional cargo ship's discharge rate is said to be around 1,500 tonnes per day whereas the SEABEE vessel, a larger version of LASH, can discharge at the rate of 2,500 tonnes per hour. A much smaller version of SEABEE known as BAGAT (Barge aboard catamaran) has twin hulls with barges stowed between hulls and on deck, 18 standard barges of 152 tonnes capacity can be carried or 3 x 450-tonnes LASH barges as an alternative. Though not specifically designed for container movements such units could be carried if suitable traffic offered. BAGAT is likely to be introduced by the British Waterways Board from the Humber estuary with direct services to the Continent.
For several years there has been much scepticism by users of containerization as to its .overall benefits; the concept was, perhaps, oversold and its low-cost advantages, less packing of goods and lower insurance, made too much of.
In May 1974 Overseas Containers Ltd announced operating profits of nearly £18m for the 12month period ended September 30 1973. To achieve this profitability in four years with a starting loss of over £6m in 1969-71 reflects credit on all concerned, not least the road hauliers whose flexibility helped the revolution in transport to succeed. OCL, encouraged by its results, plan to spend up to I:200m between now and 1980, and worldwide investment in containerization has been estimated at over £200m in the next five years — which suggests that container service operators do not take seriously any threats from rival transport modes whether or not these involve containers.
By now there must be many large manufacturers, such as Ford Motor Company, who have under taken detailed costing of freight movements using containers and alternative method. A Ford spokesman at Freight Management's conference said his company knew the freight cube of every part made. They worked out freight cube factors per part or per 100 parts and they knew how to work out the density factor, on average, for ISO containers as a basis for devising targets for shipping efficiency. Computers could be used to select optimum packing methods or even the loading sequence from a fork-lift truck.
Ford, as an international company, compare freight costs with different modes of transport in various countries and unquestionably seeks to get the best value for every pound spent on freight movements.
What is the life of a container? Sealand is said to operate some containers which are 15 years' old. Most shipping companies aim to get 8 years' life from their suites of boxes, though OCL's deputy chairman, Mr Kerry St Johnstone, reckoned their containers would last nearer 12 than 8 years. Some, he said, had been written off in three years.
Less pilferage
The huge reduction in damage and pilferage when goods are shipped in containers may not be generally accepted, since every underwriter can produce a list of horror stories. But OCL's claimed figure of lp per ton of cargo carried per year compared with 40p per ton with a conventional cargo liner operation seem worth recording.
In Britain, road hauliers and parcels carriers contributed only 4.7 -per cent of Freightliner Ltd's gross revenue in 1973 compared with 41 per cent from shipping lines and agents and 16.1 per cent from NFC companies and British Rail. The 634,343 containers carried by Freightliners in 1973 reflects a sixfold growth from 1967. and each year has seen an improvement in the capacity of trains loaded — 53 per cent 1967 and 70 per cent in 1973.
A notable development is for long-term contracts to be negotiated by large users, eg a 10year contract for container shipping traffic to and from Southampton Maritime Terminal involving six trains a day in each direction daily for countrywide distribution and collection. A number of other company train contracts for five years duration er0in the first instance have been signed. Does this long-contract Nil basis with built-in escalation factors — commend itself to road hauliers?
Although Freight liners boast that a container can be moved by rail using almost seven times less energy than by road, the company is well aware that this country is too small for the maximum economies to be achieved in trunk haulage by rail — thence its hope that the Channel Tunnel will connect it with the European rail network. In Britain in 1972 Freightliners carried about 6 per cent of the trunk haulage market between 100-200 miles, 19 per cent between 200-300 miles and 50 per cent over 300 miles. These figures were improved in 1973.
lntercontainer, the 23-nation European rail marketing body for containers, has been painfully slow in developing anything strictly comparable with the British Freightliner system. It moved the equivalent of 85,000 20ft containers in 1969 and over 435,000 in 1973, about threequarters of them maritime containers. This is less than Freight liners achieved in Britain. Inter .411111 container is said to carry about 40 per cent of all containers moving through Continental ports and crossing an international -border in Europe. The strength of road haulage opposition varies; in the German ports of Bremen and Hamburg, 50 per cent of containers are sent on Intercontainer services, while at Rotterdam the figure falls to 35 per cent and at Antwerp to 30 per cent.
Owning no containers of its own and only a limited number of special container carrying wagons, Intercontainers — if the Channel Tunnel is built — would undoubtedly feel the rough edge of British tongues if its snail-like progress continued. Freightliners see the gold on the hori7on for movements in the 2500-3000km category. Perhaps, long before that is a possibility, inter-continental lorry movements will in no way be constrained by fuel shortages or high fuel costs. Unaccompanied container movements through ports and across frontiers are subject to all the delays permitted by human frailty. Road hauliers cannot opt out of container movements but their service standards using conventional lorry operations should continue to be in great demand.