APM Terminals’ long awaited Vado Gateway terminal, a key automation project for ZPMC, will be inaugurated on 12 December this year.
APM Terminals has set the date for the inauguration of its new terminal in the Vado Ligure Port Complex, North Western Italy, and its commercial team have been “actively engaging with the market” to promote the facility. This has included presentations to key managers from the main maritime companies and shipping houses operating in the Italian market, plus attendance and sponsorship at regional events including Genoa Shipping Week .
“Once operational, the Vado Gateway Terminal will be fully integrated with the existing Vado Ligure Reefer Terminal. Vado Ligure will become the first semi-automated port in Italy with a fully-automated gate and stacking yard. The 700m deep-sea berth at Vado Gateway will be capable of handling the latest Ultra Large Container Vessels (ULCVs) and up to 1.1M TEUs per annum,” APM Terminals stated. The development also includes a new off-dock rail facility for both port terminals with 4 x 450m tracks that can support 14 trains a day.
The final STS cranes, which have a 23 row outreach and 65t capacity will be installed and commissioned in the coming months. For horizontal transport between the quay and the yard Vado will use manned hybrid straddle carriers from Kalmar, an order that was announced back in early 2016. In the yard, the terminal will have 12 ASCs when it opens.
ZPMC is providing all the crane automation and control systems for the project itself, so Vado is a key reference for ZPMC, both as a supplier and as an automation systems integrator.
The ASCs will serve road trucks, and APM Terminals is targeting “short truck-turn-times of around 30 minutes will be achieved using a truck appointment system which is fully integrated with Terminal Operating System”. The gate system will be automated with 14 reversible gate lanes and an OCR system.
Other features of the automation system include STS crane OCR, and the Navis N4 TOS. Running N4 “also enables integration with the other APM Terminals companies in the world,” APM Terminals noted.
“From 12 December 2019, the Vado Ligure Port Complex will be one of the most competitive terminals in Europe, combining innovation, automation, intermodal connectivity and the ability to offer fully integrated and complex services such as cold storage, project cargo, Ro-Ro and intermodal transport,” APM Terminals concluded.
Source: WorldCargo News