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Cargo and Passenger Transport

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Update: 2010-05-25

Cargo and Passenger Transport

Favourable geographic location is a prime attribute of the Pomorskie region which lies on the crossing of two pan-European transport routes of paramount importance for the transit traffic:

• Corridor IA (Helsinki-Tallin-Riga-Kaliningrad-Gdańsk), a branch off Corridor I (Helsinki-Tallinn-Riga-Kaunas-Warsaw),
• Corridor VI (Gdańsk-Katowice-Żylina), linking Scandinavia to Central and Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean countries.
• Poland's accession to the European Union and the ensuing access to the European funds have made it possible to implement numerous projects aimed at increasing the region's accessibility and improving the existing transport infrastructure.

Roads

The main road project in the region is the construction of the A1 motorway in the course of the E75 international road, from the Tri-city to the border pass in Gorzyczki. The building works in the Pomorskie Voivodeship have already been completed. The work front has now moved to the other sections. The entire project is to be finalised in the year 2011.

National roads Nos. 7 and 6 are equally important for Pomerania. National road No. 7 from Żukowo near Gdańsk, across Warsaw, and down to the Slovak border in Chyżne, forms a section of the E77 international road and of the E28 route (from Gdańsk to Elbląg East). By the year 2011 national road No. 7 is to be upgraded to the standard of a double carriageway. Other vital projects include the Kashubian Route. The goal of this venture is to improve access to the Tricity agglomeration from the west (now national road No. 6). The Kashubian Route, forming a section of the S6 express road in the Via Hanseatica corridor (Hamburg-Tri-city-Sankt Petersburg) will enable travellers driving in the Gdańsk-Szczecin direction encircle Gdynia and the so-called Kashubian Small Tricity (Wejherowo, Reda, Rumia).

The major road projects in the Tri-city itself include:

• the Gdańsk Southern Ring-Road, which will link national road No. 7 (S7) to the Tricity Ring-Road (S6) and the A1 motorway, thus moving the transit traffic outside the city of Gdańsk,
• the Sucharski Route, which will link the Port of Gdańsk to the existing network of national and international roads via the Gdańsk Southern Ring-Road;
• the route will also solve a bulk of the transport problems within the port and move the heavy traffic heading east and south of Gdańsk out of the city's historic centre and residential estates,
• the Karczemki junction (to be built in the final stage of the E-W Route project), which will eliminate the bottleneck on the main road leaving Gdańsk towards Kashubia one of the most popular tourist destinations in Poland (national road No. 7) and link the city centre to the Tri-city Ring-Road,
• the Słowacki Route (construction of the lower stretch of the already existing street), which will facilitate the traffic flow between centre of Gdańsk and the airport in Rębiechowo.

Gdynia closed the year 2008 with the completion of the city's key roads: the Pink Road being an alternative to the Diametral Route which forms the main traffic artery of the Tri-city, and the Kwiatkowski Route plus Janek Wiśniewski Street, both facilitating access to the Port of Gdynia.

Railway

The railway network of the Pomorskie Voivodeship offers highly convenient cargo transport, including any goods shipped in. The local lines complement four railway arteries of importance for the international traffic: from the Tricity to the German border (via Szczecin), from Gdańsk to the Czech and Slovak borders (via Warsaw and Kraków), from Gdańsk to the south-western border (via Bydgoszcz, Łódź, and Katowice), and from Gdańsk to Kaliningrad (via Olsztyn) or Belarus (via Białystok).

The E65 railway line from Gdynia to Warsaw is the site of the currently pursued revamp project. The works will involve partial replacement of the tracks and traction, and construction of collision-free rail and road crossings. The investment will shorten the travelling time for both passenger and cargo traffic. The project is scheduled for completion in the second half of the year 2011.

Airports

Today, the Pomorskie Voivodeship has one commercial passenger airport: the Gdańsk Lech Wałęsa Airport. That civil facility holding all prerequisite licences can handle all types of commercial passenger and cargo traffic, as well as general aviation flights, business flights included. Thanks to its location, the Gdańsk airport can serve a major part of the voivodeship population plus business centres outside the region.

The dynamic growth of the passenger traffic handled illustrates well the increasing role of the Gdańsk airport. Ever since the year 2000 the Gdańsk Airport has recorded a steady annual increase in the number of passengers and the volume of cargo serviced. The passenger flow in the year 2000 stood at 270 thousand, whereas in 2009 exceeded 1 910 thousand. A significant increase in the reloaded cargo has also been witnessed in the recent years (1 552 thousand kg in 2000 vs. 4 610 thousand kg in 2008). The studies conducted on commission from the Pomorskie Voivodeship Marshal Office indicate that the passenger traffic per annum can be anticipated to grow to ca. 7.5 million by the year 2020.

In response to the growing needs the airport plans a number of infrastructural investments worth nearly EUR 160 million in total. To that aim it has secured financing from the European Funds-Operational Programme Infrastructure and Environment (OPIE). The project envisages primarily:

• construction of the second terminal and the accompanying infrastructure,
• modernisation of the existing port infrastructure.

The OPIE reserve list includes:

• expansion of the cargo terminal,
• continued modernisation of the airport infrastructure.

Further plans envisage the construction of another airport in Gdynia-Kosakowo to share the landing field with the military base. The airport in Gdynia-Kosakowo is intended to provide an alternative to the Gdańsk airport and handle the bulk of charter and business flights, plus some low-cost lines.

Seaports

The seaports of Gdynia and Gdańsk are the largest harbours in the Baltic Sea region. Together, they handle almost any type of cargo and vessel. The geographic and market location of the Tricity seaports predestines them to become centres of distribution and logistics focused on the Baltic Sea region and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The seaports of Gdańsk and Gdynia are also an important link in the transport chain from the Scandinavian countries to Southern Europe, especially the Adriatic and Black Sea regions.

The Port of Gdańsk
is made up of two basins-the Inner Port stretching along the Dead Vistula and the Port Canal, with a direct outlet to the Bay of Gdańsk. The Inner Port can take vessels up to the maximum draught of 10.2 m and the length of 225 m. The Outer Port stretches out into the sea forming the deepwater Northern Port. This basin can take the largest ships sailing the Baltic Sea (maximum draught of 15 m). The modern deepsea container terminal, DCT, is located in the Northern Port.

The Port of Gdynia
specializes in container handling, which is the core business line of the Baltic Container Terminal (BCT). BCT's present reloading capacity stands at 500 thousand TEU, however investments will increase it to 1 million TEU over the next few years. The Port of Gdynia, too, has bulk and general cargo terminals fitted with modern reloading gear. It leads in servicing passenger ships, and is a ro-ro cargo handling centre, including ferry shipments. Noteworthy, the Port of Gdynia records a steady growth in the flow of all types of cargo.

The growing volume of the cargo handled, which entails the growing role of the ports of Gdańsk and Gdynia as centres of distribution and transit on the Baltic Sea, puts the management of both entities in the position of the necessity to take up numerous investments. Their goal is to upgrade the ports so as to be able to meet the market demand for cargo handling and ship servicing and create multimodal transport chains. The main project pursued by the Port of Gdańsk consists in development of 210 ha of land in the neighbourhood of the DCT container terminal into the Pomeranian Logistic Centre. Further plans include modernization of the port's internal road and railway infrastructure, and linking it to the road network which is being upgraded by the City of Gdańsk together with the General Directorate for National Road and Motorways so as to facilitate access to the port.

The Port of Gdynia has already gained direct access to the Tricity Ring Road thanks to the completed Kwiatkowski Route. The current effort focuses on modernisation of the port infrastructure. The ro-ro terminal is to be expanded, and a new ferry terminal to handle passenger traffic erected. Just like Gdańsk, Gdynia too is developing land for its logistic centres in the Western Port (35 ha) and the Eastern Port (30 ha).