Port of Liverpool’s $438m terminal falls behind schedule

Peel Ports’s much anticipated Liverpool2 container terminal was originally scheduled to open by then end of 2015, but now that date has been pushed back at least to first quarter 2016, according to local media reports.    The opening of the new £300 million (U.S. $437.64 million) container terminal at Port of Liverpool has fallen behind schedule, according to reports from the Liverpool Echo newspaper.
   The much anticipated Liverpool2 terminal was originally scheduled to open by then end of 2015, but now that date has been pushed back to the first quarter of 2016 at the earliest.
   Peel Ports has declined to comment on the delay, but the newspaper speculates it may be due to “civil engineering difficulties reported to have cost the port’s construction contractor £20 million in lost profits.”
   The port operator began construction on the Liverpool2 terminal back in June of 2013, and in November took delivery of five ship-to-shore “megamax” cranes from Shanghai-based equipment manufacturer ZPMC. The terminal, which features an 850-meter quayside, will sport a total of eight ship-to-shore megamax cranes and 22 cantilever rail-mounted gantry cranes.
   Peel Ports has said previously Liverpool2 will be the United Kingdom’s largest deepwater port and container terminal, but it will have to compete with the firmly established Southern U.K. ports of Felixstowe and Southampton for its share of the container market.
   In a recent interview with news service Reuters, Peel Ports CEO Mark Whitworth said the Port of Liverpool hopes to increase its share of the U.K. container market from 7 percent to 20 percent.
   Currently, no direct liner services call at Liverpool from Asia and only three container services call there from North America, according to ocean carrier schedule and capacity database BlueWater Reporting. Felixstowe and Southampton, by comparison, have a respective ten and nine direct liner connections with Asia, plus a host of other global container, roll-on/roll-off and multi-purpose services that call their docks.
   Peel Ports contends the Port of Liverpool will attract more cargo business once Liverpool2 is complete thanks to its central location in the U.K. Being closer to consumers, shippers would be able to save money on inland trucking and rail services. Liverpool2 will be connected to the national import center at Port Salford via the Manchester Ship Canal, road and rail.
   The port, however, will have to convince shippers and carriers alike that this is enough of a reason to divert containerships considerably off route from other Northern European destination ports, which may prove difficult in an industry that isn’t exactly quick to change course.
   The first phase of the £1.5 billion post-Panamax London Gateway terminal on the River Thames, for example, has been open for two years now, but has yet to attract any Asian container services.