COMMENT

What is it about Dublin Port that upsets people so much?

From where I’m sitting – Howard Knott – howard@fleet.ie

As 2021 dawned, the big media story in Ireland was that Dublin Port would inevitably grind to a total halt as the new Brexit rules came into play. Neither the Port nor the shipping lines operating through it would be ready for what might be called the regulatory onslaught. In reality nothing bad actually happened, exports continued to ship, supermarket shelves remained full. The only issue, and one that has not gone away, is that, though the Irish and other European Union Border Control facilities were well on top of things, their counterparts in Britain - at all levels - were all over the place.

Rosslare Europort did a hugely creditable job in absorbing a massive hike in business, but the increase in Ro-Ro business through Dublin in tonnage terms was similar. It was boosted in particular by CLdN pushing up sailings from Dublin to ten a week with ever larger vessels. Each of the container lines running direct services to continental ports have expanded their services even though some of these have had to deal with the added complication of feedering containers for Deep-Sea Lines for which COVID-19 has decimated schedules.

So, as far as the general public was concerned, nothing much happened, with the expectation that everyone should be happy with the way in which the Port, agents, Border Control personnel, shipping lines, and hauliers all met the challenges – but NO. Springtime brought its share of storms throughout Europe and locally and some ships were delayed. As the Port Company set to avoid things clogging up there was a media outcry. When the massive growth in trailer traffic moving through the Port’s Common User Terminal made it unsafe to run trains through the terminal while trucks were flying about everywhere, the papers had another go at the Port Company blaming it for pushing out this “green” mode of transport. Then, as the summer emerged David McWilliams, the high profile economist, kicked off another ‘Bulldoze the Port’ campaign - develop lots of housing and let the ships go to another, yet to be built port somewhere else. The implication of his argument seemed to be that the Dublin Port Company stood in the way of a wonderful life for an ever-increasing population of the Capital.

Taking these two specifics, my own opinion is that insofar as the Port Company is one part of the argument in each case, it is not wrong on either. The short-term solution of rail access to the Common User Terminal by adding a night shift to the operation there when trains can operate without danger is very sensible and sweats the Port assets better. The Port Company’s proposal - made in anticipation of the issue being forced - that Iarnród Eireann should develop a proper rail freight terminal in the yard across the East Wall Road, from where containers and other freight can be transferred by road to all parts of the Port, seems perfectly sensible. It is, in fact, the only way in which the Port, Iarnród Eireann and climate control activists can achieve their collective objective of significantly increasing the volumes of freight moving on the Irish Rail network.

Some twenty or so years ago I was an active enthusiast for Drogheda Port’s Bremore Port project. The plan was to build a deep-water port at this location of the Fingal/Meath border. Such a port would enable shipowners to escape the draft limitations of the current Drogheda Port. It could also accommodate traffic diverted from Dublin Port as that port reached and exceeded capacity.

This is probably where the situation remains. In the series of papers published some months ago by Dublin Port, they came to a similar conclusion based on import and export traffic projections that indicate that the present port would be totally full by 2040. Within the last couple of months, even before any possible port land grab by housing developers, that crunch date has come forward substantially and Dublin may be completely full within the next seven or eight years. Already a couple of new services have been refused by the port and there is great scepticism about the ability of Dublin Port to accept any significant return of cruise ship traffic.

I really don’t think that Dublin Port deserves all the grief sent its way.

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