Vallarpadam Container Terminal-Longest railway bridge in India.

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Vallarpadam Container Terminal is the only Transshipment port in India situated on Kochi. It is billed as the largest single-operator container terminal in the country. So now onwards motherships which can carry up to 140000 containers can reach Indian cost, Previously it has been done through Colombo or Singapore port. As the first phase is opened now it is expected to handle around 700000 containers this year itself. The length if the berth is 600 m which will be extended to 1800 m in the 2nd phase, then it will be the largest terminal operated by a single operator.

The first phase of the Terminal have a capacity of 1 million TEU s which consists of 600 metres of quay, six Super-PostPanamax Quay Cranes and an on-dock railhead serviced by rail-mounted gantry crane. Construction of a new four lane bridge and highway access to the ’golden quadrilateral’ road network is already underway. Vallarpadam will be expanded ahead of demand to eventually total 1.8 km of quay and at least 16 Quay Cranes capable of handling the largest vessels afloat, with associated yard-handling equipment and a capacity of 3 million TEUs

FACTS :

Constructed a 4 lane raod between vallarpadam and kalamassery to handle the heavy traffic of the terminal, which will be known as NH-47 C. When completed the total cost is expected to be 1000 Cr. Out of the 17.2 km, around 9.25 km goes through bridges. there is 12 major bridges, 1 fly over, 25 box culverts and 14 pipe culverts and 5 under passes are constructed in the road to ease the traffic.

Vallarpadam Rail Connectivity :

Rail Vikas Nigam Constructed a railway line to the vallarpadam terminal with a total length of 8.86 km, in which 4.62 km through Vembanad bridge, which become the longest railway bridge in India. Also constructed a railway station and electirc substation at Idappally. The Vallaarpadam Port Railway station has been constructed by the Dubai Ports World.

The soil conditions were a challenge that RVNL engineers overcame with great élan. The bridges have been built on 1.2-diametre piles driven to an average depth of 55 metres. The total pile length is 65,000 metres.

Besides, 11,700 tonnes of reinforced steel; 58,000 tonnes of cement; 99,000 cubic metres of metal aggregates; 73,500 cubic metres of sand; 1,27,000 cubic metres of concrete work and 1,54,308 cubic metres of earth work went into building the new railway link.

The total cost of the project is estimated at US$500 million and will be funded by DP World through non-recourse debt funding. The debt is provided by a consortium of banks led by the IDFC, set up to provide growth capital for infrastructure projects in India.

DP World has estimated that the total initial investment required will be approximately US$20 million which includes the immediate provision of four RTGs and two Mobile Harbour Cranes to the Terminal -to improve yard handling, truck turnaround time and quayside operations. Strategically located on the main east-west global shipping lines and offering draft of about 16 m, Cochin is destined to develop as the premier gateway to southern India, as also offering an alternative to Sri Lanka and Singapore for containers being transshipped for the Indian market

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