Three Gorges Dam congestion caused by annual maintenance and COSCO Shipping Lines’ countermeasures
According to the government's notice，the morth channel of “three gorges dam" on the Yangtze River have been under maintenance from February 2, 2017 to March 14th. The project takes 40 days to complete. This is the most comprehensive maintenance since the gorges put into use from 2003, whose estimated impact to Yangtsz feeder transportation will be up to 3 to 4 months.
As of February 16 the number of ships that wait in the vicinity of the dam to pass through Three Gorges dam accumulate approximately 900，upward - 478 and downwards - 392, respectively. At present, the average waiting time is more than 10 days. From now on, the south channel of the Three Gorges will pass through upward sailing and downward sailing in turn every 48 hours.
During this weekend, the estimated number for the ship will be more than 1000, and the expected waiting time next week will be extended to 15 days. The round time of sailing is prolonged，Low turnover of vessel results in capacity loss about 40-50%
The Three Gorges Dam "maintenance" cause longtime congestion. In order to the reduce the impact of the “maintenance”, the company has taken many different approaches, including launching more vessel，exclusively using escalator to rapidly climb over three gorges dam, and river rail intermodal, under which containers will be barged to Wuhan firstly，then using railway all the way to Chengdu.
This river-rail transportation service connects the famous city of the central area of Yangtze River area Wuhan and the most important city of West China, Chengdu. The whole service will run 1347KM and take 2-3 days.
