London Gateway set to announce first service

[Andrew McAlpine]

Looks like London Gateway is about to announce is first service.
The South African SEACS service of Maersk, MOL & DAL is set to move from Tilbury to gateway in November.

Currently the following vessels operate non the service,

MOL CULLINAN
DAL KALAHARI
LARS MAERSK
MOL CALEDON
SAFMARINE NOKWANDA
SAFMARINE NOMAZWE
MAERSK GATESHEAD
DAL STELLENBOSCH

watch this space.................

[Phil English]

Thanks for the info Andrew. Sadly not very exciting from a (Thames) shipspotting point of veiw.

Brgds
Phil

[canberra97]

Well good news for London Gateway in securing their first service but bad news for Tilbury in losing such an important customer one that stems back to 1981 when the SEACAS service moved from Southampton.

Although I am not totally surprised I guess it was quite obvious for SEACAS to consider the move to London Gateway and I bet DP World had sights on them from the very start.

I wish good luck to London Gateway in the future with their excellent new container facilty but ss long as no shipping lines are poached away from Southampton I will be happpy

[Riverman2903]

I think we all wish London Gateway good luck, just don't poach anything else from Tilbury either as photo opportunities are going to be further reduced at Gravesend/Tilbury


I wish good luck to London Gateway in the future with their excellent new container facilty but ss long as no shipping lines are poached away from Southampton I will be happpy Wink

[ChasB46]

Hapag-Lloyd returning to Southampton from Thamesport with three Transatlantic services from October.GAX , GMX and PAX.

[chrisg46]

The current mutter (just a bit louder than a whisper) that I have is the Hapag-Lloyd incoming services at Southampton may replace the CMA-CGM ULCC calls, which will move to Gateway. Based on the suggestion that Gateway's labour costs will be the lowest per unit, combined with very promotional pricing and increasing use of automated/operator-free systems in the container yard, I think Gateway will be giving non-DP World clients a lot of food for thought.

It's worth remembering that DP World may be very willing to juggle calls between their Southampton and Thames facilities - particularly if they think they can move high-volume ships and services into Gateway, where costs per box will be lower . . .

Its also possible that HPUK's Felixstowe and Thamesport facilities may have to get into financial competition with DP World operations, which could mean more mobility between ports . . . interesting times ahead.

[Arcadian]

Interesting times ahead.
One may think the cost per box is lower at Gateway, but that is not the case.
DP World have huge infrastructure and dredging costs to recoup, so there will be no heavy discounting just to get a Far East Line.
CMA CGM's FAL services through Southampton are performing well, and the Line have placed information for their customers on their website saying that Southampton is the natural UK gateway for their services from the Far East and Indian Sub-Continent.
Whether the situation changes when P3 starts in Q4 of 2014, time will tell...

[chrisg46]

Seen some figures. London Gateway will be buying business from appropriate customers with discounted rates, and juggling services between the 2 ports as new berths become available. Making profits or recovering cost in the early stages of this kind of business are secondary aims, against the key objective of actually having traffic coming alongside.

[chrisg46]

It strikes me that we in the UK don't really have a grip on the scale of global port operators, like DP World and Hutchison Ports.

We think that

[Alan Green]

The East Anglian Daily Times carried an article on 13.08.13 suggesting rumours were circulating that London Gateway would be announcing the transfer of 3 shipping lines from Felixstowe.

[chrisg46]

Not quite true, Alan - I interviewed 2 or the key people in this story a couple of days ago, and the actual story is that County Councillor Graham Newman suggested to some MPs that if the Felixstowe's key road link, the A14, were to be converted to a toll road, Felixstowe would lose a lot of trade, including Maersk, MSC, and at least another.

In other words, it's Graham Newman trying to use scare tactics to prevent a action that he fears, and the cut-and-paste press picked up on the most worrying aspect . . .