Livorno – All the pieces are now in place. The port set up that, from tomorrow, will take shape is much more orderly. Passenger traffic will finally be able to expand in a larger area than ever before. Darsena Toscana’s East bank will be used by CILP Dockers’ Company for handling new car traffic and Grimaldi’s eco-class Ro/Ro ships, which, until yesterday, were handled at the Alto Fondale berth.
With the formal approval by the Management Committee this morning, the new layout of the port, designed and developed by the Port Network Authority’s top management over the last few years, is finally taking shape.
“Today marks the end of an extremely complex project that has taken a number of years to complete. It has been carried out meritoriously by our State Property dept. senior executive Fabrizio Marilli and his staff, with a continuous, fruitful collaboration with stakeholders and the other institutions involved,” said PNA president Luciano Guerrieri at the beginning of the meeting.
“The port’s new layout allows us to free up areas in the ‘Passenger Port’ and to rationalize the use of Darsena Toscana’s east bank, bringing port activities into line with the Port Masterplan and, in particular, with the development opportunities the Piattaforma Europa infrastructure project presents” he continued.
The process of developing the ideal port was certainly a long one and not without difficulties. Started at the beginning of 2022, it was divided into three stages, two of which were completed over the last few days with the issuing of the provision formalizing the leasing of the areas behind the public berths 15C and 15D, on Darsena Toscana’s east bank, to the CILP Dockers’ Company and its relinquishing the areas it had been renting at the root of the Alto Fondale, i.e. berths 45, 44 and 43. These will be returned to the Port Network Authority so that they can subsequently be reallocated to Porto 2000 together with berths 46 and 47.
Over the past two years, the Authority has been working on perfecting the procedure for reorganizing and optimizing port areas, issuing, in October 2022, a joint ordinance with the Harbour Authority revising and updating regulations on the use of public berths. It detailed the new concession set up, indicating the quays to be made available to non-concessionaire companies pending the completion of the relocation processes already underway.
Over the same period of time, CILP got to work on modernizing its new operating area, which it took possession of after obtaining an early occupancy permit from the Port Network Authority. Between December 2023 and January 2024, the Dockers’ Company completed fitting out the quayside, building new bollards and upgrading the access gates.
The third and final stage of the process will be formalized over the next few months. It involves CILP reconsigning the warehouses it had at the Alto Fondale. They will be returned to the PNA once the doubling of the MK warehouses has been completed.
Directly related to CILP’s relocation from the Alto Fondale, in view of improving the management of the terminals on Darsena Toscana’s east bank, the Port Network Authority approved the modification of the layout of Lorenzini terminal. It involved the terminal operator giving up a 2500m2 area behind berth 15 C (which will become part of the CILP concession) and being granted the lease of a new 1776 m2 quay area at berth 15 C. Part of the supplementary concession agreement also involved granting Lorenzini a new 724 m2 concession behind Calata Tripoli, with the purpose of improving the conditions of the access road to the terminal with its new layout.
Translation by Giles Foster