Liner shipping

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Liner shipping or scheduled shipping denotes, in contrast to tramp shipping , ship traffic that calls at several ports within one timetable . They are therefore part of the regular service . Depending on the route, route and cargo or passenger volume, several ships are usually used on liner services. This increases the number of calls to the port, the cargo can be removed more quickly, and customer satisfaction increases. Since the introduction of a regular service high material (ships) and organizational problems (schedules, congestion) entails, it is common in shipping that shipping companies for certain lines to liner conferences unite. Scheduled services are common, for example, in passenger , RoRo or container shipping . The ships used for liner shipping are also called liner ships , but this usually means a military type of ship that travels in line .

requirements

Liner services in maritime shipping are characterized, among other things, by compliance with certain criteria:

  • Regularity of loading and unloading times on predetermined days and even distribution over the year.
  • Departure frequency with sufficient frequency.
  • Punctuality of the scheduled departures.
  • Operational stability through adherence to the operating grid over a longer period of time.

history

Conventional liner shipping 1870–1965

The Cap San Diego , example of a conventional ship of the line
Simonskerk of the Vereenigde Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Maatschappij (1963)

Apart from the forerunners of the liner shipping, the Börtschifffahrt or row shipping, cargo was mainly transported by sailing ships in the tramp shipping until around 1870. In the first half of the 19th century, the first liner services with sailing ships developed from parcel delivery and the transport of emigrants. The further development of steam technology and the introduction of telegraph networks gave the shipowners the technical possibilities to carry out reliable liner services with steam ships . From 1870 on, liner shipping developed rapidly. The most important trade routes led from Europe to the colonies in Asia, Africa and South America, in Germany, for example, operated by the Hamburg-American Packetfahrt-Actien-Gesellschaft (HAPAG) to North America and the Woermann Line and the German East Africa Line (DOAL ) to Africa.

Until the 1970s, the classic liner was a multi-purpose general cargo ship (usually with its own loading gear) that was able to carry a mixture of different different cargoes ( finished goods , semi- finished goods , bulk goods , refrigerated cargo , passengers, often with tanks for different equipped with liquid cargoes). In the last half of the 20th century, this versatility led to the construction of very expensive, complex special ships that were precisely tailored to their trade areas. An example of this is the Pointe Sans Souci by the Compagnie Générale Maritime . This ship was built for European- Caribbean travel, had a deadweight capacity of 8,000 tons and hatches for refrigerated cargo, containers , vehicles and cargo on pallets. It was equipped with loading facilities for bananas, a RoRo ramp and tanks for rum .

The increased splitting off of cargo shares to the bulk carriers working at lower freight rates , the concentration of the main lines to the industrial centers of Europe, North America and Japan on the general cargo ships , which are relatively expensive to build and maintain as well as loading and unloading , but also the independence of most of the colonies led to it Problems in conventional liner shipping. The charterers from the industrial sector wanted faster, safer and cheaper transports. The shipowners needed ships that were not in port for half of their working time for loading and unloading. Since the 1950s, this has led, among other things, to the increased construction of very expensive express freighters , which were used in particular on the very long liner services, since their speed advantage was most effective here. Towards the end of the 1960s, against the background of increasing containerization, there were attempts to use fast variants of the Liberty replacement ships, which were increasingly inexpensive at the time, in liner shipping. a. the British type SD-14 or the German types Trampko and 36L . Between 1967 and 1971, the Blohm + Voss shipyard tried in vain to gain a foothold in this segment with its revolutionary Pioneer type (inexpensive construction based on the modular principle with largely dispensing with curved components, simultaneously available in different versions).

Container liner shipping from 1960 to today

Container ship Colombo Express (8,750 TEU)

The solution was to standardize the cargo. In the USA there has been shipping with containers since 1956 through the Sea-Land Corporation . By standardizing the dimensions of the loading units, the container revolution could begin. In 1966 Sea-Land started the first container liner service across the North Atlantic . For liner shipping, this meant massive investments in container ships, port infrastructure and cargo handling. This led to bankruptcies, start-ups and mergers as well as diversification of the entire maritime industry. Special ships now transport the cargoes that could previously be transported by multi-purpose general cargo ships (car transporters, product tankers , mini bulkers ). Liner shipping is now part of combined transport , the shipping companies not only offer pure sea transport, but mostly control the handling of the entire transport chain from door to door.

literature

See also