2014 - 2015 Central and Southern Corridor

Started by giftgrub, March 10, 2014, 12:24:52 AM

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Normandy

Stena explorer, It is lovely to say all the infrastructure is there but really only for the HSS where it think it would be much slower turn arounds the other fast crafts as the other linkspan is the otherside of the terminal. Sadly it seems fast ferries have had their day, the amount that have disappeared from our shores in the last ten years is unreal !

Steven

Thing is Stena don't need Dun Laoghaire as they already have a replacement facility in Dublin Port.  Lough Ryan Port was needed as Stranraer just could not accommodate modern vessels - hence the acquisition of Stena Navigator and the significant investment made in her as a stop gap.  Personally I fear for Dun Laoghaire's cruise plans with Dublin Ports plans for a cruise terminal - hopefully there will be enough trade for both!  However, if its a choice of one or the other and they are similarly priced I'm sure the cruise lines will probably opt for Dublin given it is much more famous a name outside these islands.

Regarding Stena's pricing - they could fill Explorer and still loose money.  More passengers create higher costs as well. As I have said before, at present Explorer is nothing more than an overflow valve for Nordica.  Nordica's passenger certificate is the problem on the more passenger orientated sailings. 

The passenger numbers just wouldn't be there to run Explorer over more sailings without loosing a fortune - after all, for most of the year Nordica's tiny capacity is adequate.  This isn't a case of put on the capacity and the passengers will come unfortunately, its a matter of supplying the capacity at times people actually want to travel.  Regarding the infrastructure,  the link span doesn't have many years left anyway.
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

Fast Ferry Fan

#77
Quote from: Fast Ferry Fan on August 29, 2014, 12:02:31 AM
If Stena had no intention of running the HSS in 2015, they wouldn't have loaded her sailings into their booking engine over 6 months beforehand.  There have been plenty of years when you've had to wait until October or November to be able make next year's booking.  It would be rather disingenuous of them to knowingly offer a service and then pull it and say, "Ah, we've got another ship we'll sure you'll like just as much which we're going to transfer you to, though it admittedly it (i) doesn't go quite as fast (ii) has sailing times you might not like as much and (iii) doesn't go to the same place."

Running both the Superfast X and the Explorer for a year also allows the Superfast to bed down properly and see how it fares trying to tempt Explorer passengers.

Oh dear.  I'm no longer so confident that the HSS will run next year.  Whilst the Dun Laoghaire sailings are still in the booking engine, post Christmas, the surcharge that has always existed for travelling on the HSS has been removed, so there is now no difference between the cost of travelling on a 8.55am / 10.30am sailing or a 1.30pm / 3.10pm sailing.

Stena explorer

That's very interesting with the surcharge gone (finally a level playing field) I doubt it though, more likely so they can switch you to dublin port without any hassle of surcharge refunds.  One way or another it would be great if stena line just came out in the near future and told us what their plan for 2015 was.or are they going to keep us guessing into the new year , I know Steven is great at getting bits of info through the pipeline , so hopefully he might have a bit of info soon .

Steven

Quote from: Stena explorer on September 13, 2014, 06:09:16 PM
That's very interesting with the surcharge gone (finally a level playing field) I doubt it though, more likely so they can switch you to dublin port without any hassle of surcharge refunds.  One way or another it would be great if stena line just came out in the near future and told us what their plan for 2015 was.or are they going to keep us guessing into the new year , I know Steven is great at getting bits of info through the pipeline , so hopefully he might have a bit of info soon .
The problem is nobody knows, not even the crew onboard (the permanent staff will transfer to Nordica anyway when Explorer isn't running).  Stena are still playing stupid over Superfast X as well, and I suspect that both will be made public around the same time (so covering over the bad news with the good news) but that's just my personal hunch.  It's just a case of wait and see I'm afraid.  Regarding the surcharge, it could be intentional or it may be a website glitch.  I wouldn't read into it either way personally.
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

HSS

#80
Quote from: Fast Ferry Fan on September 12, 2014, 08:14:22 PM
Quote from: Fast Ferry Fan on August 29, 2014, 12:02:31 AM
If Stena had no intention of running the HSS in 2015, they wouldn't have loaded her sailings into their booking engine over 6 months beforehand.  There have been plenty of years when you've had to wait until October or November to be able make next year's booking.  It would be rather disingenuous of them to knowingly offer a service and then pull it and say, "Ah, we've got another ship we'll sure you'll like just as much which we're going to transfer you to, though it admittedly it (i) doesn't go quite as fast (ii) has sailing times you might not like as much and (iii) doesn't go to the same place."

Running both the Superfast X and the Explorer for a year also allows the Superfast to bed down properly and see how it fares trying to tempt Explorer passengers.

Oh dear.  I'm no longer so confident that the HSS will run next year.  Whilst the Dun Laoghaire sailings are still in the booking engine, post Christmas, the surcharge that has always existed for travelling on the HSS has been removed, so there is now no difference between the cost of travelling on a 8.55am / 10.30am sailing or a 1.30pm / 3.10pm sailing.

Try April 2015 onwards, a difference in price on the UK site, Holyhead-Dun Laoghaire.

Steven

#81
Quote from: Stena explorer on September 11, 2014, 06:49:54 PM
Also all they(the harbour board) are talking about now is cruise liners , (it must be quite profitable to be in) they are planning to start work on a new 15 million jetty before end of year, which will accommodate ships up to 315 meters long , and dredging to 11 meters , and next year  dunlaoghaire has already got 23 cruise ships confirmed with over 66,000 passangers arriving.
They might want to make that jetty a little longer!  Royal Princess visited Belfast today, she's 330m long and the ship based in Europe next year.  Going forward I don't see cruise ships getting any smaller any time soon.


(more at www.flickr.com/tarbyonline)

The August shippax stats came my way today.  Stena Explorer is down -% on passengers and - on cars vs last August.  Stena's Holyhead-Dublin service is up -% on pax and -% on cars but a drop of -% on trailers - however so is every route apart from Birkenhead-Belfast which has bucked the trend and also looks to be the best performing route overall.  The fishy route is up -% on passengers and cars but down on buses.  Freight is the same as last year.  No Irish Ferries stats due to their quarterly reporting.

EDIT: due to the republishing of potentially sensitive information
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

Stena explorer

#82
Disappointing numbers for the explorer ,but expected, , I think the 10.30 holyhead to dun laoghaire sailing is the one  that has been pulling the figures down badly, as she was often very busy to near full on the 13.30 dun laoghaire -holyhead sailing , I think those figures might  be the ones that knock her on the head after christmas. With the explorer figures for this year,decreasing stena have a  valid case to pull out of dun laoghaire that will be hard for anyone to argue against now.   Out of dublin  port it looks like the epsilon is eating into  the stena freight a bit, but with the economy picking up both companies look set to gain new business over the next year. Nice to see figures up a bit in roslare. 

Steven

#83
Quote from: Stena explorer on September 19, 2014, 11:06:48 AM
Disappointing numbers for the explorer ,but expected, , I think the 10.30 holyhead to dun laoghaire sailing is the one  that has been pulling the figures down badly, as she was often very busy to near full on the 13.30 dun laoghaire -holyhead sailing , I think those figures might  be the ones that knock her on the head after christmas. With the explorer figures for this year,decreasing stena have a  valid case to pull out of dun laoghaire that will be hard for anyone to argue against now.   Out of dublin  port it looks like the epsilon is eating into  the stena freight a bit, but with the economy picking up both companies look set to gain new business over the next year. Nice to see figures up a bit in roslare.  Steven is there any chance you could publish those august shippax numbers for the dublin ,dun laoghaire and roslare routes ,( it's always fascinating to see the monthly figures broken down ) much appreciated .

Sorry, but the figures are not meant for public consumption and tbh I may have already published too much!  As my post has now appeared (word for word) on Facebook I probably won't post so much detail (if anything) next time!  Shippax (understandably so) don't want their information widely shared to people who do not subscribe to their service.  I'm not going to jeopardise my access to this information and risk being "blacklisted"  due to this information being shared with the whole world.  For the record I have now edited my original post.  Whilst I accept this is a public forum, I didn't think someone would make this information MORE public.

As for Epsilon eating into Stenas share, it's impossible to say without seeing IF's stats.  For all we know they could be down overall as well.  The entire freight market is down apart from Stenas Birkenhead route whichever I think is telling.
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

Stena explorer

ICG say their freight volumes in year to date are 20% higher than last year !so with only so much business to go around , it's clear that the epsilon is eating into business from someone ,that's for sure,  with these freight boys  the most important thing is price, so irish ferries maybe are doing well in that field, but we won't know for sure until the year is out , to see the full picture. Also previous post edited.

Steven

Quote from: Stena explorer on September 20, 2014, 09:09:35 AM
ICG say their freight volumes in year to date are 20% higher than last year !so with only so much business to go around , it's clear that the epsilon is eating into business from someone ,that's for sure,  with these freight boys  the most important thing is price, so irish ferries maybe are doing well in that field, but we won't know for sure until the year is out , to see the full picture. Also previous post edited.

The problem is, as of yet we don't know where that freight volume is!  We are not even comparing like for like (Dublin -Cherbourg I hear is doing well, though I am also hearing much of this is at the expense of Rosslare).  Certainly 20% (and thats the headline figure not the actual figure which is 18.5% if you look in the actual report) is not the same as 20% growth (or decline) would be for Stena, who have had only a slight decline during June.  At a guess I would say they have taken some trade from Stena, some from P&O, and some of the growth.  Unfortunately i don't have any Seatruck figures available to hand.  IF carried 118,100 RoRo units in the first half of the year over all routes, compared to 99,700 the year before is all we know.  We also have found out that Epsilon costs €3.6 million to fuel for 6 months.  This part from last years ICG result could be key btw

QuoteThe Republic of Ireland's RoRo market returned to growth with a 3% increase in overall market carryings during the first half of the year followed by a 6% increase in the second half, to provide full year growth of 4%. This is a welcome sign of Ireland's return to improved economic health.
ICG also had 15.7% growth in RoRo over the second half of last year - given Epsilon's arrival late in the year she would not have affected these figures much.
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

Normandy

I think with all the speculation as regards who is winning the freight war Steve's comments are very sound as we are not comparing like with like and the Irish ferries figures from the second half of 2013 cast more doubt and not company is not going to capitise on a good head line for share price and media attention.

I am aware Stena have released the booking for 2015 and indeed so have Irish ferries for Ireland France but I am surprised we are not seeing some interworking of the Rosslare ships on UK/France services.
Also I am surprised at the fact both Stena and Irish Ferries depart Ireland on a Saturday for cherbourg with freight ships as there is an artic ban on the weekends in France meaning the stuff sits till late Sunday night/ early Monday morning and also freight leaving Cherbourg must be in the port by late Friday/ early saturday. It strikes me alot of resourses of road Hauliers is tied up as a result. I would have thought particularly on Stena's part a fast three trips per week monday-friday and a more passenger focused trip[ on the weekends would have made more sence, I know this dates back to the Celtic link days.
Anyone able to shed some light on this? 

giftgrub

Quote from: Normandy on September 22, 2014, 10:37:02 AM
I think with all the speculation as regards who is winning the freight war Steve's comments are very sound as we are not comparing like with like and the Irish ferries figures from the second half of 2013 cast more doubt and not company is not going to capitise on a good head line for share price and media attention.

I am aware Stena have released the booking for 2015 and indeed so have Irish ferries for Ireland France but I am surprised we are not seeing some interworking of the Rosslare ships on UK/France services.
Also I am surprised at the fact both Stena and Irish Ferries depart Ireland on a Saturday for cherbourg with freight ships as there is an artic ban on the weekends in France meaning the stuff sits till late Sunday night/ early Monday morning and also freight leaving Cherbourg must be in the port by late Friday/ early saturday. It strikes me alot of resourses of road Hauliers is tied up as a result. I would have thought particularly on Stena's part a fast three trips per week monday-friday and a more passenger focused trip[ on the weekends would have made more sence, I know this dates back to the Celtic link days.
Anyone able to shed some light on this?

One of the main drivers of the French service at the weekends alongside freight is the self loading freight of passengers in their cars and motorhomes, if you have ever been in Rosslare on a Saturday when both ships are in port together the volume of traffic that comes off the two ferries is very impressive, obviously the major backbone for both operators is freight but don't discount the impact of passenger traffic on the routes. As for interworking the Rosslare and Cherbourg routes for Stena, I would be very surprised to see any crossover between the two ships as they are quite different in terms of linkspans and loading/unloading requirements etc, also crews/fuel consumption/ services provided etc,

Steven

Quote from: giftgrub on September 22, 2014, 09:06:45 PM
Quote from: Normandy on September 22, 2014, 10:37:02 AM
I think with all the speculation as regards who is winning the freight war Steve's comments are very sound as we are not comparing like with like and the Irish ferries figures from the second half of 2013 cast more doubt and not company is not going to capitise on a good head line for share price and media attention.

I am aware Stena have released the booking for 2015 and indeed so have Irish ferries for Ireland France but I am surprised we are not seeing some interworking of the Rosslare ships on UK/France services.
Also I am surprised at the fact both Stena and Irish Ferries depart Ireland on a Saturday for cherbourg with freight ships as there is an artic ban on the weekends in France meaning the stuff sits till late Sunday night/ early Monday morning and also freight leaving Cherbourg must be in the port by late Friday/ early saturday. It strikes me alot of resourses of road Hauliers is tied up as a result. I would have thought particularly on Stena's part a fast three trips per week monday-friday and a more passenger focused trip[ on the weekends would have made more sence, I know this dates back to the Celtic link days.
Anyone able to shed some light on this?

One of the main drivers of the French service at the weekends alongside freight is the self loading freight of passengers in their cars and motorhomes, if you have ever been in Rosslare on a Saturday when both ships are in port together the volume of traffic that comes off the two ferries is very impressive, obviously the major backbone for both operators is freight but don't discount the impact of passenger traffic on the routes. As for interworking the Rosslare and Cherbourg routes for Stena, I would be very surprised to see any crossover between the two ships as they are quite different in terms of linkspans and loading/unloading requirements etc, also crews/fuel consumption/ services provided etc,

What that man said.

My understanding of the lorry ban is that it is in effect from 22:00 on Saturday to 22:00 Sunday (apart from during public holidays) and so is more of a Sunday ban than a weekend ban.  Given the 18hr crossing time I wonder how much of the freight being carried is accompanied?  The weekend crossing is always going to be a compromise between the interests of passengers and hauliers as well as being dictated by ship availability.  As for interworking, while on the surface it may make some sense in practice it would probably cost a fortune.  As GG says both operators have very different ships on their Rosslare services.  Europe also has much smaller freight capacity vs Horizon - Horizons freight space simply isn't needed to Fishguard, likewise Oscar Wilde has proved her self capable but less than ideal of running the Pembroke link.
Steve in Belfast (suburbia)

Flickr: www.flickr.com/tarbyonline

munchkin

#89
hi all, been lurking a while and decided its time to register!

anyhow, regarding the lorry ban.
In most countries,  France included, theres exceptions for live animals and foodstuffs so regardless of a general lorry ban, an awful lot of what arrives in Cherbourg can head up the road straight away for the rest of France/ Germany / continental europe.
A truck laden with the likes of Kerrygold butter or other foodstuffs, could make it to Germany or low countries (breaks taken into consideration) in time for Monday morning by arriving at 10am on the Sunday morning.
If driving a car you can drive through the night 12 or 14 hours long, and at a quicker speed (meaning a late Sunday evening arrival gets you across France to be in Germany/ Holland for Monday morning), but trucks are slower and drivers must have regular breaks and can only do 9 or 10 hours at a time.

Theres a document outlining the situation of truck bans in France and surrounding countries here:
http://www.bison-fute.gouv.fr/IMG/pdf/09024-4__EN_Brochure_vehicules_lourds_2014_def_web-2.pdf
and here some info on the EU rules on HGV driver breaks etc
https://www.gov.uk/drivers-hours/eu-rules