DP World mum on opening of Gateway project

A new corner of England, all 60 acres of it so far, has risen out of the Thames Estuary in south Essex over the past six months — but the first sight of what is to become the US$2.39 billion London Gateway super port has yet to persuade Dubai Ports World to indicate when Europe's largest port and logistics development will be open for business.

DP World, controlled by the interests of Sheikh Mohammed, the ruler of Dubai, was yesterday celebrating the first six months of construction work at the shut-down Shell Haven deepwater port and oil refinery downstream from the Port of Tilbury.

It has dredged six million cubic metres of the Thames seabed so far and begun a land reclamation programme that eventually will produce a new dock nearly two miles long and the size of about 150 football pitches. A workforce of 300 will increase to 700 by the end of the year, with a peak construction workforce of 2,000.

Yet Simon Moore, chief executive of London Gateway, is refusing to commit to an opening date for a project that has been 11 years in the planning and which DP World inherited when it bought P&O in 2006.

He said that the first phase of the $637 million dredging and reclamation programme should be complete by the end of 2012. An initial kitting-out of the quayside to open a first berth to cater for the 400m mega container ships would take at least another nine months after that.

However, apparently with one eye on the world economy and the other on the struggling finances of Dubai World, DP World's parent company, Moore said: "We will open operationally only in line with demand."
(Source:www.cargonewsasia.com)