Maersk Line launches Europe-America service
Maersk Line is starting a third liner service between Rotterdam and the United States. The service, ATL4, is part of the 2M alliance between Maersk Line and MSC. In North America, ports of call will be New York and Savannah. The first departure will be this month, Port of Rotterdam said in its media release.
2M offers a total of four Atlantic services, three of which call in Rotterdam. The others are the ATL 1 (to Norfolk, Charleston, Miami and Houston) and the ATL 3 (to Charleston, Freeport, Veracruz, Altamira, New Orleans and Mobile).
In 2013, about 46 million tonnes of containerised cargo was transported between Northwest Europe and North America. Rotterdam’s market share amounted to twenty percent. At the beginning of 2015, twelve of the eighteen transatlantic container services called at the port of Rotterdam. Transatlantic trade is on the up. Other shipping companies, in addition to 2M, are also increasing their frequency/capacity or launching services including, partially, new ports of call.
