Port of Dunkirk rolls out multimodal and logistics development plan
The port of Dunkirk wants to provide logistics and industrial businesses with a new area for their operations in the Western Port area: DLI Sud (Dunkerque Logistique International Sud), the Port of Dunkirk news release said.
In parallel with the port’s formalities for obtaining all the permits to allow the area’s development, the Eiffage Group is developing an innovative multimodal and logistics project on the DLI Sud site. Compliance with existing regulations for the protection of health, safety and the environment make the logistics and traceability of hazardous materials a crucial subject for many industrial or distribution operators.
The project was presented in a public meeting on Friday 12 April 2013 before the Permanent Secretariat for the Prevention of Industrial Pollution (Opal Coast S3PI) in Dunkirk. This presentation was preceded by questions to the port about its development plans for the DLI Sud area as a whole, within which the Eiffage Group’s project must be included. According to the project’s current schedule, work should begin in 2015 and last for a total of four years, broken down into three phases.
Covering an area of 75 hectares (including 20 ha of natural space), the infrastructure will comprise 96,000 m2 of covered warehouses with storage of containers in automated units, the first of its kind in France. The multimodal project will also include 18km of railway lines. The expected logistics volumes will ultimately be 850,000 palettes and the equivalent of 100,000 containers, five trains a week and 500 HGVs a day.
Christine Cabau Woehrel, Chair of Dunkerque-Port’s Executive Committee, says: "This new multimodal facility, central to the development projects for the port’s future infrastructures, is also fully in line with its sustainable development and action policy."
And Claude Cadot, Industrial Development Director of the Eiffage Construction Group, comments: "This innovative infrastructure anticipates changes to the logistics chain for hazardous goods and reinforces intermodal operations that encourage the use of consolidated transport modes. It meets a specific demand that is not provided for within the present logistics offer."
