Private hauliers provide double benefit at CT port

THE MOVE to allow private road hauliers into the port of Cape Town has had distinct benefits after the scheme settled into place, according to Gavin Cooper, chairman of the SA Association of Freight Forwarders (SAAFF) in the Cape. "First of all, you have the choice of any private haulier you want," said Cooper. "But also, because Portnet's transport section, Freight Dynamics, suddenly lost a lot of business they had to jack-up their service and become a lot more efficient. The only area that has been bugged by gremlins, Cooper added, was in getting abnormal container sizes into the port. "Portnet doesn't have the straddle carrier equipment to handle oversize cargoes so they need to use the gantry cranes to take the containers off the incoming vehicles at the ship's side." This was where using private truckers could have its costs, according to Cooper. "You can't have a big piece of equipment just sitting at the quayside waiting for its turn under the gantry crane," he said, "something that costs you an extra R4 000 or whatever an hour." One of the answers, Cooper said, was to take the container to SACD (SA Container Depots) for offloading then to move it to the ship's side by Freight Dynamics' truck-trailers.