Inland shipping fights back

In spite of the global crisis last year, inland shipping strengthened its position in the hinterland transport of containers, with the modal split at the Port of Rotterdam rising from 30% to 33%. At the same time, rail transport declined from 13% to 11%, back to its 2006 level, whilst road transport moved back from 57% to 56%.

The total volume of hinterland transport declined 12% from 7.8m teu in 2008 to 6.8m teu last year. Comparative figures show that 755,000 teu were transported by rail, a decline of 25% compared to 2008, with barges seeing a 3% decline to 2.2m teu (2.3m teu in 2008). Truck volume dropped 14% from 4.4m to 3.8m teu.

Part of the decline in rail transport was as a result of the failure to adapt its tariffs fast enough in the face of declining total volumes. The Betuwe Route tariffs for example were lowered only late in 2009.

In contrast, inland shipping and road transport were more flexible in the face of capacity oversupply, besides which, inland shipping took advantage of the improved handling capacity at Rotterdam’s deep sea terminals. However, road transport suffered as a result of intra-European ro/ro traffic being hardest hit by the economic downturn.

The future goal is to achieve a modal split by 2035 of: inland shipping 45%, rail 20% and road 35%. The future growth of container handling will be strengthened from 2013 when the new terminals at Maasvlakte 2 will come into operation.

Since 1993 both the Dutch government and the Port of Rotterdam have supported a policy aimed at decreasing the share of road haulage, which. over that period, has declined from 66% to some 50%.
(Source:www.container-mag.com)