Types of Maritime Shipping Services: Passenger, Liner, Bulk, and Tramp Explained

Passenger Shipping Services. A passenger ship is defined as any vessel carrying or configured to carry more than twelve non-crew passengers. Passenger ships include ferries, ocean liners, and cruise ships, and are normally separated into two types: The ferry fleet consists of ships used for short voyages without accommodations that may also carry vehicles and cargo. The ferry fleet includes conventional ferries and fast ferries. The latter includes monohull ships, catamarans, hydrofoils, and hovercraft. The cruise fleet consists of ships specifically designed for longer voyages. Currently, the global passenger fleet consists of 1,575 passenger-only vessels (including cruise ships) and 2,624 ships suitable for passengers and freight. Worldwide, more than two billion passengers were transported in 2010 and the total number of cruise ship passengers was almost twenty-one million.

The fastest-growing segment of passenger shipping over the past two decades has been the cruise fleet. This segment consists of vessels that carry upwards of 3,000 passengers. The cruise market primarily serves the Mediterranean, Caribbean, and Baltic Seas; the Atlantic islands; and North American and European rivers.

Liner Cargo Services. Liner cargo services transport cargo for several shippers simultaneously and operate on regular schedules between ports (“liner trades”). This contrasts with bulk shipping (see later), where contracts are made with a single shipper on an as-needed basis. Vessels used in the liner trades include general cargo, container, refrigerated (reefer), roll-on/roll-off (ro-ro), and other specialized ships. The liner trade is increasingly multimodal and composed of large shipping companies that are able to guarantee delivery at specific times.

Currently, container shipping represents over 75 percent of the liner trade by volume. Annually, half of the world’s trade is shipped in over fifteen million containers making over 230 million journeys. Over 531 million TEUs were shipped in 2011, with nearly 5,000 container ships in operation.

Bulk Cargo Services. Bulk cargo services exploit a variety of ship configurations to convey their payloads around the planet. They carry petroleum products (e.g., crude oil, condensates, and refined products), liquefied gases (e.g., liquefied natural gas and liquid propane gas), liquid chemicals (e.g., cooking oil), foodstuffs (e.g., grains, sugar), and solids (e.g., ore, coal, sulfur, bauxite/alumina). In 2011, a total of 8,687 bulk carriers were in service around the world, and 45 percent of the world’s crude oil production was shipped by sea. This represents 1.8 billion tons, or about 70 percent of the dwt shipped by bulk cargo services Bulk cargo ships are generally purpose-built for specific cargos, and bulk shipping companies often focus on specific cargos (e.g., oil tankers). Ships participating in the bulk trades generally do not operate on scheduled services, but are exclusively chartered/ contracted by shippers on long-term contracts.

The bulk carrier Catherine Manx, constructed in 2014, anchored close to the port of Algeciras. Spain, waiting to receive raw materials from one of the quays in the harbor (Jose Lledo/ Dreamstime.com)

Tramp Services. Tramp ships, or general traders, are cargo ships, normally with two to six holds, that carry a variety of cargos, including grains, ores, forest products, and foodstuffs. Tramp services operate throughout the world but are prevalent in East and South Asia. These services are ad hoc in nature and do not adhere to fixed schedules. Rather, they anticipate and exploit niches and seasonal markets (“spot markets”) that are often too uneconomical for liner and bulk cargo services. Tramp services are generally composed of smaller ships, are often family owned, and respond quickly to market conditions and opportunities as they arise. Although tramp services are not as prevalent as they once were (outside of Asia), they continue to operate in densely populated regions such as the North American Great Lakes, the Baltic, the Mediterranean, and other enclosed seas.