The Ocean Alliance and Ocean Network Express (ONE) will remove some ships and consolidate US port calls in their jointly-operated trans-Atlantic network. The move follows an uneven year in the trade, with US exports to Europe up strongly but Europe’s exports to the US slowing.
Ocean Alliance partner CMA CGM said Friday its trans-Atlantic network will change effective in April. The new network, CMA CGM said, will provide the US East Coast with “stronger coverage [and] reinforced frequency” and better leverage CMA CGM’s US and European terminals.
The biggest change will be the end of the “Unity Bridge” service between major Northern European ports and the ports of Charleston and Savannah. Unity Bridge, which operates with four ONE ships and one Evergreen Marine vessel, will make its last westbound departure from Le Havre on March 16.
The south Atlantic US ports will instead be included on the rotation for the higher-capacity Liberty Bridge service, which currently calls the ports of New York-New Jersey, Norfolk and Baltimore.
The new Liberty Bridge service will drop Baltimore as of the first westbound sailing from Southampton on March 27. Charleston and Savannah will be added after the Norfolk call.
The new trans-Atlantic network comes after the Ocean Alliance and ONE revised their one-year-old vessel sharing agreement filed with the Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) on Feb. 6 to consolidate their north and south Atlantic networks into a broader North American trans-Atlantic service.
The new agreement will see seven ships deployed in the revised trans-Atlantic network, compared with the 11 ships the carriers deployed under the separate north and south Atlantic networks. ONE will go from providing four ships to the soon- expiring south Atlantic network to two ships under the revised trans-Atlantic network.
Cosco and OOCL will also remove a ship, providing two to the new network. Evergreen will also remove a ship, providing one to the new network.
Details please refer to the JOC news.
Source: JOC