Freight News, IT, Logistics, Road, Sea

Tech firm suggests ways to avoid 20-day Dover delays

[ January 14, 2021   //   Chris ]

Increasing check-in times to 20 minutes at the Port of Dover, in line with non-EU member customs policy, would lead to a queue of 70,594 and a backlog of around 20 days, says digital simulation firm, Simul8.

It adds that while the 27-acre emergency lorry park at Manston helped to decrease overcapacity its figures suggest that five new lorry parks on this scale would be needed to bring the situation in line with capacity.

Introducing a new route that could carry 20% of cargo through alternative UK ports such as Hull or Southampton could further alleviate the problem and is worth exploring, it says.

Chief technology officer Frances Sneddon said: “There are no illusions that some important contingency plans are needed to ensure that goods travelling between the UK and EU will be able to flow at least as efficiently as pre-Brexit levels.

“This particular digital simulation plays with just a few of the viable options that have been posited, and it begins to provide useful evidence for the best solutions, but it really just touches the surface of the variables at play. Wider modelling will produce the roadmap that is needed to unlock the challenge in adjusting the UK’s flow of goods through its ports as it leaves the EU.

“Testing all of this in a digital space before it can cause any major disruption in the real world makes digital simulation a unique and invaluable ally.”