Smart Port system launched at Tallinn’s Old City Harbour

Starting from October 3^rd, the Smart Port system was launched at Old City Harbour’s A-terminal for the passengers travelling with vehicles on Eckerö Line, Viking Line and Moby SPL ships. The Smart Port system means that before and after the check-in the vehicles will be directed to the ship using the electronic displays and thanks to the automatic licence plate recognition the check-in personnel have more information about the arriving vehicle and the booms will open automatically for cargo vehicles. This will make the procedure of boarding the ship so much more convenient and faster!

Port of Tallinn initiated the Smart Port project in order to reduce car and truck passengers’ waiting time by providing holistic and easy to understand service organizing electronic line management for ports with multiple ferry operators. The project was developed in cooperation between Estonia and Norway with the advising partner of Port of Kristiansand. 

“The need for the Smart Port solution arose because of the problem that several city harbours, including Port of Tallinn’s Old City Harbour, are facing. In recent decades, the number of passengers has increased many times, but ports’ territories have remained mostly unchanged, which presents a great challenge to their service quality, capacity and throughput,” explained Hele-Mai Metsal, the initiator of the project from Port of Tallinn’s side. 

“Port of Tallinn developed a new electronic traffic management system both for passenger cars and cargo trucks for all four ferry operators who are operating at Old City Harbour area in Tallinn. The scope of the project includes the journey of cars and trucks on the harbour area and once the check-in is done, the fully automatic traffic management system leads cars to the ship” added Mrs Metsal.

The Smart Port solution creates ground for several benefits to different parties involved. Passengers’ waiting time will be reduced, work load of the ferry operators will be reduced and thanks to the shorter waiting time of cars and trucks the environmental pollution from running engines will also be reduced. 

The Smart Port solution was developed and tested in the Old City Harbour in Port of Tallinn. To ensure the scalability of the solution for other ports, Port of Kristiansand was involved in the project as a partner. Port of Tallinn has an ambition to develop the Smart Port solution to a product and enter into the international markets. 

The Smart Port solution in Old City Harbour’s D-terminal will be launched in Spring 2018. In D-terminal the digital solution will go even further and in addition to the electronic line management system enable also fully automatic gates for passenger cars.