THE Dublin Port Company (DPC) has announced it will develop a second empty container depot as part of the 22-hectare first stage development of Dublin Inland Port north of the city near Ballymun, reported Dublin People Media .
Dublin Inland Port is located 14 kilometres from Dublin Port off the M2, with direct access to the M50 and to Dublin Port via the Dublin Port Tunnel.
Coming to the market this week is a 3.2 hectare facility, construction of which will be completed by year end.
When fully operational in early 2023, the new facility will have a storage capacity of 4,000 TEU. This will be in addition to the existing 6,000 TEU facility which commenced operations at the start of this year.
It brings to EUR50 million (US$52.3 million) DPC's total investment to date in Ireland's first inland port facility.
The further development of Dublin Inland Port continues the delivery by DPC of the commitment in Masterplan 2040 to maximise the use of existing port lands by relocating port-related, but non-core activities - including empty container storage - away from Dublin Port.
It comes as unitised volumes - containers and trailers - grow back towards the peak volume levels of 2019.
One quarter of all containers moving through Dublin port are empty because of the structural inefficiencies in container supply chains created by trade imbalances.
Given the pressure on land, storage facilities for mountains of slow-moving empty containers awaiting export can no longer be accommodated in Dublin port.
Over 10 years, the volume of containers moving through Dublin Port has increased by 60 per cent to 843,000 TEU in 2021.
All four remaining empty container depots will be redeveloped to provide more throughput capacity on Dublin Port's fixed footprint over the coming years as Dublin Inland Port develops.
"The removal of empty container depots to Dublin Inland Port is essential in achieving this objective. We expect to complete the Stage 1 development of Dublin Inland Port by the end of 2023 to provide capacity for all of the remaining port-related but non-core activities currently located in Dublin Port," said Dublin Port Company CEO Eamonn O'Reilly.
"Once this is done, we will develop capacity for the transit storage of laden containers and trailers at Dublin Inland Port.
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