Logistics firms and corporates are already making efficient use of the new R20 billion Cato Ridge Intermodal Logistic Hub although construction of the main development is only expected to officially break ground in July/August. Warwick Lord, CEO of the Cato Ridge Consortium, told FTW that the development aimed to alleviate congestion around the Port of Durban by driving the government’s agenda to move cargo from road to rail. South Africa’s single biggest infrastructure development, it will eventually encompass 850 hectares and the consortium has secured 385 hectares of land at this stage. “The vision of the dry port is to alleviate pressure on the Durban port and to enable customers importing or exporting freight to collect from Cato Ridge which isn’t constrained by the sea on one side and the city on the other. It allows for international best practice which is moving congested sea port activities further afield,” Lord said. “It’s a back of port expansion with the idea of making the logistics in this country simpler, more efficient and more cost competitive.” Lord said this would be achieved by a rail shuttle service between Durban port and Cato Ridge to drop off and collect freight. The ship stack would be built in Cato Ridge and the freight railed at the appropriate time. “It adds a lot more flexibility to the system and allows for storage of containers outside of very expensive and valuable port land,” Lord said. “We are still in the development phase and we aim to kick off construction in July/August. We have had many expressions of interest from Distribution Centre (DC) operators and logistic companies,” he said. An estimated 5 000 jobs will be created during construction, while the developed project will provide between 10 000 and 15 000 new permanent positions. Lord said the rail shuttle service was already running along the Natal Corridor line following completion of a Transnet proof of concept project to test the system. “We are looking to have rail doing the long haul and trucks doing the short-distance distribution because that’s historically how it used to work,” he said. However, he said there were capacity constraints impacting efficiency at this stage. “The capacity constraints come largely from operational rather than infrastructural issues. We have about 10 to 15 years on our volume projections before we would require significant upgrades to the rail infrastructure between the port and Cato Ridge.” Lord said operational efficiencies – in terms of train speeds and running shuttles back to back – were significantly higher in other countries on the same infrastructure. However, he said as demand grew the infrastructure would be re-engineered to allow for faster train speeds in future. “We are on a narrow gauge standard in South Africa and the topography of the Natcor line between Durban and Cato Ridge is quite windy in certain sections. There is the ability to flatten off some curves as well as some rises and falls as part of our medium term plan.” However, he said the line had already received sufficient investment and was currently fit for purpose.
