Inland ro-ro
Page 79
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
THE TENDENCY for increasingly large and heavy engineering structures to be built up at the fabricating yard rather than -on sitealways has to take into account the limitations set by existing road and rail weight and loading gauge restrictions.
In the case of electrical, power station and nuclear engineering technical reasons usually preclude any other way than to carry an indivisible load and some European specialists, notably two Dutch concerns, have accordingly re-discovered the use of inland waterways as the most economical method of carrying big loads, Several purpose-built ro/ ro barges have been commissioned this year for use on the extensive European network of waterways navigable by vessels up to around 1,350 tons_ In some cases these barges offer little more than a flat deck platform on which the road-train or trailer is carried; in a more sophisticated design the load can be run into the opentopped hull to provide ade quate clearance for overbridges etc.
In the Liege industrial region of Belgium many years of pressure by industrial concerns were rewarded recently by the inauguration of the country's first inland ro/ro berth at the Albert Canal port of Seraing. Built at a cost of around £500,000 the new facilities, located at the heart of the Belgian canal system and opening up access to all important European inland ports, has given local industry the means to remain competitive producers of oversize plant.
Ironically, the need to move a paddle steamer, over 140ft long, from Lake Neuchatel in Switzerland to a new permanent mooring on the Rhine at Basle is already occupying heavy-lift specialists in Switzerland. The overland section of this operation, almost 60km, requires painstaking preparation for one of the most spectacular road hauls of recent times.