Marinas & Harbours Luxury Yacht & Superyacht News

Building on the success achieved during a first contract to design a marina in Gibraltar in 2008, PORALU MARINE landed a contract for a second phase of works on the Iberian Peninsula.

5.8 km² in area, Gibraltar is a very popular location, with 7.2 million tourists each year. However, Gibraltar is seriously short of facilities to host visiting yachtsmen, currently having a mere 4 marinas with approximately 1,000 moorings. It is against this background that two phases of work to create a new marina were launched.

This large scale project, awarded to PORALU MARINE, is part of a project capable of accommodating 300 boats measuring from 10 to 45 m.

Gibraltar, a project in two stages for a large scale marina

After inaugurating the first phase of the works on this site in April 2008 with a value of some 800 k€, PORALU MARINE went on to win the invitation to tender for a second stage, which accounted for a value of approximately 450 k€.

Started in mid-March 2010, this covers the design and construction of 72 further moorings to accommodate boats with lengths of 12m, 15m, 18m and 25m (including 12 units for 25m boats). Installed on piers and on Ellipse anchors, this pontoon development is clustered around ‘leisure island’, a complex comprising bars, shops, offices and casinos forming the central point of “Ocean Village”.

•The PORALU MARINE and NAUTISCAPHE (Poralu’s partner) teams started their mission by installing 200 metres of pontoons required for the boat show organized last April. After the show 50% of these pontoons were retained as they were installed originally, with the remainder re-organized in order to optimize the space around the island.

NAUTISCAPHE, which specializes in underwater anchoring systems and holds a patent for an elliptical anchoring device, installed 74 mooring Ellipses and anchoring buoys.

•In mid-May, work on site continued with the installation of the moorings and buoys to the 74 Elipses for a further 100 metres of pontoons, creating 66 berths. 2 wide gangways and a large platform were attached to the quay and provide excellent access to the marina.

Some key data for the previous phase of the works

This first phase covered the installation of floating pontoons with the special “MANTA®” design, with H-beam anchoraging and in a curved layout. These now serve the businesses and restaurants of the port complex.

This phase comprises:

•3 pontoons, each 60 metres long in a curve, for mooring 18 boats 15m in length. Each pontoon forms a platform, accessible via 2 gangways;

•1 pedestrian access pontoon at 4.75m wide and 93 metres in length, also provides moorings for 48 small local boats.

•1 pontoon 35 metres long, reserved for temporary mooring of boats belonging to yachtsmen utilizing the bars and restaurants.

Why PORALU MARINE won the contract

Overtaking its competitors in this sector, PORALU MARINE was able to capitalize on its expertise to take this contract.

With the backing of a R&D department at the forefront of technology, PORALU MARINE now offers an extensive range of products at the top of the range. The ECOSTYLE™ decking, constructed in environmentally friendly materials, covers all the pontoons. This product, exclusive to PORALU MARINE, is designed in a polypropylene composite material, is non-slip, resistant to rot, does not crack and needs no treatment. Guaranteed for 10 years, its design and composition mean that it lets UV light pass through it, therefore doing no harm to the aquatic fauna and flora below. This luxury marina also includes products taken from the MANTA® range, which combine aesthetic and technical criteria. This is a concept which resulted from a partnership between PORALU MARINE and an engineering design consultant.

With this third site, PORALU MARINE is continuing to make inroads in the UK based Markets. In 2007, the company was working at West Mersea, a town located on Mersea Island in the county of Essex in south-east England to replace the local authority pontoon giving water access to the local community. The pontoon of 100m long and 4m wide with a 36m by 9m t-end provides facilities for fishing boats unloading their catches, yachts, dinghies and other recreation requirements of the local community. For this project, PORALU MARINE installed dinghy deflectors on the perimeter of the pontoons, which prevent boats with low freeboard from being stranded between the structure of the pontoons and the seabed at low tide. The pontoon is designed to rest on the ground between tides, so the entire structure rests on the ground twice a day.

About Poralu Marine

8,000 references over the five continents have lifted Poralu Marine into the ranks of the leading international companies in the field of top of the range pontoons and harbour facilities.

PORALU MARINE is a leading player on the international stage, with two production units in France and in Canada (Montreal), a subsidiary in Australia, sales offices in Germany, Italy, Spain, England and in China and a network of agents working the key international markets.

Founded in 1982, PORALU MARINE is a systems integrator for marinas, which devotes its work to developing unique solutions and sailing facilities, in phase with its customers’ economic, social and environmental imperatives. Adventurous by nature, PORALU MARINE was one of the first in its field to use aluminium as the exclusive structure for pontoons. With the backing of a R&D department at the forefront of technology, PORALU MARINE now offers an extensive range of products: diving rafts, leisure pontoons, private jetties, etc. …, bridges, catwalks, landing stages, etc.

Based in Port (01) – France (head office), PORALU MARINE has a workforce of 120 and posted consolidated sales for FY 2009/2010 of 19 M€, of which 70% came from international trade.