HPC Hamburg Port Consulting, the logistics consultancy for ports, sea and inland terminals, and intermodal rail transport, has been commissioned by the German Directorate-General for Waterways and Shipping (GDWS) to conduct a study on information services for ports and terminals, the company reports. The analysis is part of a European project developing a digitization strategy for freight transport on continental European inland waterways.
HPC examines information systems for ports and terminals for the digitization of European inland waterways
As the central federal agency of the Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration, GDWS is participating in the Digitization of Inland Waterways (DIWA) project, which is funded by the EU Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) program and involves four other national inland waterway authorities: the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Austria. The project aims to develop a joint and integral strategy for digitizing the inland waterways of the TEN-T corridors in order to make the inland waterway mode of transport more competitive and sustainable in the long term.
"We are pleased that we as GDWS, together with the European project partners, will be able to help shape the future of European inland waterway transport and contribute to this environmentally friendly mode of transport being able to contribute its performance even better," say Thomas Wagner, Head of Department Transport Engineering Inland and Tobias Aretz, National DIWA Coordinator (both GDWS).
As part of the business process development under the DIWA master plan, HPC is tasked with exploring information services for ports and terminals. The focus is on an inventory of the business processes between inland navigation and European ports as well as the IT system landscape in order to determine the existing digital maturity level and future potentials regarding the digitalization of processes between port and inland navigation.
"The inclusion of inland navigation in the overall development of intermodal transport concepts is very welcome against the background of the heavy utilization of road and rail systems," says Hartmut Beyer, authorized signatory at HPC. "The digital transformation of inland waterways will significantly increase the attractiveness of inland navigation for customers. As HPC, we are very pleased to contribute to the strategy development of this important trans-European project with our combined port and IT know-how."
HPC has many years of expertise and has advised inland ports nationally and internationally on operational issues, analyses as well as digitalization projects. For example, HPC supports the Hamburg Vessel Coordination Center HVCC regarding optimization and coordination when feeder and large vessels meet on the Elbe and in the port. In addition, HPC has successfully implemented digitization and inland navigation projects on the Rhine, in India and the USA.
Furthermore, HPC is an active member of the working group Inland Vessel of Hamburg Hafen Marketing. The focus group aims to strengthen the role of inland shipping in the Port of Hamburg.