Rostock officials are aware of the plan but are not saying anything about it.

However the port’s capability speaks for itself. It has 700,000 cu m of liquid cargo tank storage and a tanker harbour with berths for six tankers up to 90,000 dwt with handling of up to 10,000 tonnes an hour. Pipelines and tank rail services are also on hand Since 1990, Rostock has built its strategy on competence in all but conventional container handling, a sector which literally ‘went west’ after unification. Instead the port has  honed its international rail shuttle and intermodal container business and now boasts Scandinavian- Europe services which are second to none. Of the record 28.5m tonnes handled last year, 60% of cargo was in that sector.

A spokesman tells Port Strategy,port aims are many and varied and include “the development of Rostock into the southern Baltic’s most significant ferry  and ro-ro port with the greatest number of routes”. 

Other aims include the creation of what he terms “vertical and horizontal strategic alliances” as well as the intensification of competition within the port, establishing competence in supply chain management and intensifying marketing.

Also on Rostock’s strategic wish list, the spokesman tells PS, is boosting supremely important and now extremely successful intermodal traffic up to about 85,000 units a year and improving what are already respectable hinterland road and rail links.