Travel Times News

The shipping industry's pledge to limit its carbon footprint may suffer a setback as the current Red Sea crisis prompts it to use more vessels and take longer routes to ensure the smooth sailing of global maritime trade.Iranian-backed Houthi militants' attacks on vessels passing through the southern Red Sea have choked trade through the Suez Canal, driving many container shipping companies to add 10-14 days to the voyages between Asia and Europe and add more vessels.The disruption…

Gustavo Alcides Diaz, an Argentine fisherman and hunter from a river island community, is at home on the water. The Parana River once lapped the banks near his wooden stilt home that he could reach by boat. Fish gave him food and income. He purified river water to drink.Now the 40-year-old looks out on a trickle of muddy water.The Parana, South America's second-largest river behind only the Amazon, has retreated this year to its lowest level since its record low in 1944, hit by cyclical droughts and dwindling rainfall upriver in Brazil.

Grains ships and vessels transporting other products on the Paraguay River are loading at around half capacity due to a historic drought that has hit river levels in the South American region, hurting trade of key agricultural commodities.Industry insiders said that many cargo holds on ships were being left empty, travel times were being delayed and farmers in the world's fourth-largest exporter of soybeans were having to hold on longer to grains that they couldn't ship."The situation is critical and delicate…

The North Carolina Ferry System (NCFS) has been designated by the federal Maritime Administration as a Marine Highway Project, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elaine L. Chao announced ThursdayThe designation, a first for the state, will allow the ferry system to apply to the Marine Highway Grant Program, which awards federal funding to modernize vessels and improve infrastructure at terminals. This year’s grant program awarded $9.7 million to marine highway projects across the…

It was Canadian whalers, the Norwegians tell us, who first noticed that a dead whale does not bob in the waves. The carcass didn’t pitch or roll, either, and it was somehow “self-propelled” — its fins giving it forward motion and acting as stabilizers, or foils. The story still inspires Trondheim company Wavefoil, maker of scalable, retractable foils that offer ship owners and designers fuel savings and passenger comfort. In Norway, high-speed ferries, cruise ships and fishing vessels are the first customers for retrofits and newbuilds.

The St. Louis Regional Freightway has compiled a summary of the major developments over the past year that either elevated the St. Louis region’s global status as a world-class freight hub or will help to advance the region’s position as the country’s freight nexus in the year ahead.“From mega projects breaking ground and global companies choosing to invest here, to newly formed partnerships that strengthen the bi-state region’s role in national and global supply chains, there was much to be excited about in 2019…

Social media, cameras, sensors and more generate huge amounts of data that can overwhelm analysts sifting through it all for meaningful, actionable information to provide decision-makers such as political leaders and field commanders responding to security threats.Sandia National Laboratories researchers are working to lessen that burden by developing the science to gather insights from data in nearly real time.“The amount of data produced by sensors and social media is booming — every day there’s about 2.5 quintillion (or 2.5 billion billion) bytes of data generated…

A set of complicated lock-and-dam projects on the Illinois Waterway, from Chicago to the Mississippi, has yellow lights flashing throughout the Midwest freight industry. In effect, the entire Waterway will be shut down next summer as the Army Corps of Engineers, Rock Island Division, starts some hefty replacement and maintenance projects, from LaGrange to Brandon Road locks and dams.Officials advise maritime, freight and agricultural businesses to look ahead now, to prepare a logistics scenario that will be ready by July 1, 2020.

Lock Closures Starting on the Illinois Waterway This Summer May Result in  More Freight Flowing Through St. Louis Region.Businesses that move or handle commodities on the Illinois Waterway system are being encouraged to start making alternative plans due the scheduled closure of locks on that inland waterway system. With a two-week closure planned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers beginning as early as August 2019 and closures of 90 to 120 days expected in the summers of 2020 and 2023…

The heavy lift sea transport provider SAL Heavy Lift has delivered 12 bridge sections for the Beitstadsundbrua bridge from China to Norway.The final bridge is part of the largest road construction project in northern Trøndelag, will measure 580 m in length and will connect the municipalities of Steinkjer and Malm, crossing the Beitstadfjorden.The bridge will make travelling between northern parts of Trøndelag county considerably safer, as well as reduce travelling time significantly.In a mountainous country like Norway, which is cut apart by deep fjords, bridge building is a virtue of necessity. Today there are over 18.000 bridges, summing up to 446 km and each with an average length of 250 m, spread across Norway.

The Northwest's boat builders Nichols Brothers Boat Builders (NBBB) has won a design and build contract to build two new high-speed passenger-only ferries for Kitsap Transit with an option for a third.The Kitsap County, Washington public transit agency launched a new fast-ferry service in July 2017 between Bremerton and downtown Seattle with plans to add service connecting Kingston and Southworth to Seattle.Earlier this year, Kitsap Transit purchased the “Finest,” a 350-passenger high-speed catamaran from New York Waterways and shipped it to Puget Sound.Following a refurbishment at NBBB, Finest started its inaugural run between Kingston and downtown Seattle the day after Thanksgiving on the busiest shopping day of the year.

The Panama Canal welcomed the inaugural transit of the LNG Sakura as it carried the first-ever liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipment from the Dominion Cove Point terminal in the United States to Japan. The transit, which occurred this past weekend, marks the beginning of a new LNG commercial route between the United States and Asia from the recently inaugurated Dominion Cove Point terminal in Maryland, the second U.S. LNG export terminal to come online after Sabine Pass began operations in 2016. Dominion Cove Point has two main clients: ST Cove Point, a consortium consisting of Sumitomo Corporation and Tokyo Gas; and Gail Global LNG, a subsidiary of GAIL LTD of India.

Incat Crowther has delivered City Jet 1 and City Jet 2. The 28m Passenger ferries are part of a six vessel new build program for the Cancun-based operator, Ultramar. The vessels will operate at high frequency across the enclosed lagoon adjacent to Cancun, thereby sparing tourists a notoriously lengthy bus trip and reducing travel times by up to 70%. The ferries were built by Midship Marine in Harvey, Louisiana. The main deck cabin can accommodate 118 passengers in high-end seating. Sliding doors are fitted at both the forward and aft ends of the cabin for ease of access. The aft deck features a bathroom, electrical closet, standing room for passengers, and plenty of room for luggage. Also featured on the aft deck is a raised engine hatch increasing maintenance space in the engine room.

Three years ago coatings giant Jotun was buying up real estate for U.S. market access and location savings. The effort to get closer to its shipping and offshore customer base is still underway with research aimed at protecting client assets in frontier areas like the arctic. An R&D expansion at Flixborough in the U.K. and in the Arctic archipelago of Spitsbergen aims to make active the fire response of passive surface treatments. There’s a need to address fires in enclosed steel workplaces plus high-temperature hydrocarbon fires.

China will send more ships flying its flag to take the Northwest Passage via the Arctic Ocean to cut travel times between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, says the state news agency Xinhua. The world's largest maritime carrier China COSCO Shipping Corporation will send more cargo vessels on Arctic voyages through the Northeast Passage. COSCO's freighter Yongsheng set out Saturday in northern port city of Tianjin for Britain. The ship will travel through the Arctic Ocean shipping route for the third time following voyages in 2015 and 2013, when it became China's first commercial vessel to explore the Northeast Passage. At least two more huge freighters will travel on the route in August in separate voyages, said the company.

China will encourage ships flying its flag to take the Northwest Passage via the Arctic Ocean, a route opened up by global warming, to cut travel times between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, a state-run newspaper said on Wednesday. China is increasingly active in the polar region, becoming one of the biggest mining investors in Greenland and agreeing to a free trade deal with Iceland. Shorter shipping routes across the Arctic Ocean would save Chinese companies time and money. For example, the journey from Shanghai to Hamburg via the Arctic route is 2,800 nautical miles shorter than going by the Suez Canal. China's Maritime Safety Administration this month released a guide offering detailed route guidance from the northern coast of North America to the northern Pacific…

Rapidly rising floodwaters brought barge traffic to a near standstill on the middle section of the Mississippi River on Monday, halting shipments of goods such as soybeans, concrete and road salt, government officials and traders said. The deadly storms have killed more than 40 people in flooding and tornadoes, snarling air and road traffic during one of the busiest travel times of the year. The rain and snowfall were washing into Midwestern rivers, making it dangerous to operate barges and almost impossible to load them, barge traders said. The Mississippi River at St. Louis was expected to rise to nearly 45 feet (13.7 metres) by Thursday, which would be the second-highest crest after the record of 49.58 feet (15 metres) on Aug. 1, 1993, according to the National Weather Service.

Ivory Coast abolished a state monopoly on passenger traffic on the lagoon surrounding the commercial capital Abidjan, the government announced on Wednesday, clearing the way for outside investors. Abidjan, a city of around 6 million inhabitants, straddles the Ebrie Lagoon. The SOTRA urban transportation company, majority-owned by the state with a minority interest held by Italian bus manufacturer Iveco, runs several water-taxi lines. Government spokesman Bruno Kone said the waterways had been under-utilized. "This will allow other entities to make major investments," Bruno said after a cabinet meeting. He also announced the approval of an agreement between the transportation ministry and Rainbow Ferry Lines…

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced today that dredging operations are expected to resume on Wednesday in the Upper Hudson River. In 2014, dredging will begin south of Schuylerville, New York and proceed south towards Troy. Dredging will also occur in a two-mile section of river near Fort Miller that is not easily accessed by boat. Dredging is being conducted to remove sediment from the river bottom that is contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).

Transportation, Energy Ministers from Asia-Pacific Nations Pledge Cooperation on Cleaner, More Energy-Efficient Transportation. Transportation and energy ministers from 21 economies in the Asia-Pacific region today agreed to continue progress on initiatives to make transportation in the region cleaner and more energy-efficient, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced today. The announcement came during the first-ever joint Transportation and Energy Ministerial Conference held by the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)…

Blue Sky Network, a supplier of satellite tracking and communication solutions for aviation, land and marine, announced several new map overlay enhancements to its cloud-based fleet management solution, New SkyRouter. The new overlays include third-party weather feeds and localized traffic information from Bing Maps. Blue Sky Network also provides an overlay for oil and gas lease block data in the Gulf of Mexico and customer specific overlays such as pipelines or power lines. These enhancements can be combined with existing asset tracking information to improve a single map view source.

The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) announced Friday that 72 projects will receive a total of $600 million from the sixth round of the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) program. Of these, 12 Coalition for America’s Gateway and Trade Corridor (CAGTC) member projects were awarded a total of $135 million for projects with full costs exceeding $490 million. One in three grant dollars, just over $198 million, was awarded to 25 projects supporting freight movement. Compared to previous rounds, this represents a decrease in the amount of money and total awards given to freight relative to other types of projects.

The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) announced it will swap vessels at the Lower Algiers to Chalmette ferry route due to a mechanical issue. The Motor Vessel Levy will be replaced with the smaller M/V St. John at 1 p.m., today. The smaller vessel will run indefinitely, so ferry passengers should expect delays during peak travel times. DOTD said it will alert the public when the larger boat is ready to resume service. dotd.la.gov/ferry