MOVES TOWARDS CONTAINER PORT

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31989, 16 May 1969, Page 1

MOVES TOWARDS CONTAINER PORT

The transporter crane to be installed at Cashin Quay to prepare Lyttelton as a container port would be 14ft higher than the Christchurch Cathedral spire and its cross, Mr J. B. Bushell, the Lyttelton Harbour Board’s assistant chief engineer, said yesterday.

Mr Bushell used this illustration during a talk to the annual meeting of the New Zealand committee of the International Cargo-Handling Co - ordination Association yesterday.

There had been a steady decline in the use of the conventional wharf cranes, Mr Bushell said, and with the increasing use of containers and specialised bulk-hand-ling methods the decline would continue. The harbour board was phasing out 10 cranes and he had no doubt others would follow. The cranes had been extensively advertised, but had to be sold at a price about equivalent to the cost of the paint involved in repainting, or about i per cent of their existing replacement cost There were two mam methods of transferring con-

tainers to and from a trans- 1 porter crane. The chassis 1 system, used in America, in- < volved containers being carried on flatbed trucks or 1 trailers and generally they 1 remained on them. Trailers i would cost about $4500 each, 1 and he doubted whether the < system would be applied outside the United States. Second System 1 The second system— j straddle carriers—would re- ; quire double axles at each ( corner of the machine to i operate on most existing i wharf structures which were designed for the same stand- j ards as bridges, about 14 tons i and a half axle load. Most ] container berths now were : designed for 50-ton axle i loads. Lyttelton had not been i chosen as a container port, < Mr Bushell said, but the re- i port of the Metro consultants i said that the estimated sav- | ings from introducing con- 1 tainers to the New Zealand i trade could be up to 75 times ]

the additional costs of Lyttelton operating as one of the container ports. The costs, on the other hand, of not developing Lyttelton as a container port, would be directly related to the unbalanced development of New Zealand as a whole. Bulk Trade Use The board was considering the introduction of specialised handling equipment of a similar type to that associated with containers for use with the existing bulk trade. Preliminary investigations had shown no reason why the functions of bulk-ship loader and unloader and container crane could not be incorporated in the one plant The projected future for the continued improvement of cargo handling at Lyttelton was regarded as being of vital importance to Canterbury and the South Island, but also to the balanced development of New Zealand, Mr Bushell said.