Adriatic Gate Container Terminal (AGCT), the Croatian subsidiary of International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI) at the Port of Rijeka in Croatia, welcomed the new Rijeka Land Sea Express, a weekly vessel and intermodal service linking Rijeka to Central European countries.
Led by COSCO Shipping and rail freight partner Ocean Rail Logistics, the service consists of the regular maritime Piraeus-Rijeka Express Service (PRS) exclusively connecting Rijeka and Piraeus, and aligned rail connections: block trains on the Rijeka-Budapest-Rijeka and Rijeka-Belgrade-Rijeka routes.
By interconnecting maritime and rail services using the Rijeka Land Sea Express, COSCO offers its clients a transit time of 32 days from East China and 28 days from South China to Budapest, using Piraeus and Rijeka as ports, ICTSI said.
AGCT chief executive officer Emmanuel Papagiannakis said this latest development is expected to further improve Rijeka’s position as the northern Adriatic gateway for Central and Southeast Europe.
“We would like to extend our gratitude to all the stakeholders involved for their cooperation and professionalism in this start-up, as well as their continuous support for this project which has strongly positioned Rijeka port and traffic route as the south entrance for Far East to Central Europe trade,” Papagiannakis said.
Since the start of the project, COSCO’s throughput via Rijeka has increased by 30%, ICTSI said.
ICTSI recently drew up plans to expand its Croatian subsidiary, including a two-phase dredging scheme of 130 meters of quay over Berths 1 and 2. Once dredging is completed, AGCT will be the first terminal in the northern Adriatic able to berth vessels of up to 20,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in capacity, with an LOA (length overall) of up to 400 meters and beam of 59 meters.
Complementing these initiatives are new quay cranes with an outreach of at least 24 rows as part of the berth upgrade, and new rubber tired gantries and prime movers introduced on the landside.
Work on upgrading AGCT’s on-dock rail terminal is also being advanced to be able to offer an annual capacity of 360,000 TEUs per year. The upgraded rail yard will feature two new rail mounted gantries over four rail lines.
Total terminal yard capacity is expected to increase up to 600,000 TEUs per year, in line with demand.