Transportation Corridor News

Norwegian shipowner MPC Container Ships (MPCC) has signed a $55 million pre and post-delivery ECA covered financing agreement with Deutsche Bank and SINOSURE for its two dual-fuel methanol newbuildings.The vessels are scheduled for delivery towards the end of 2024 and are secured by 15-year time charter agreements with North Sea Container Line (NCL). The loan matures in 2036, according to MPCC.Chinese-based shipyard Taizhou Sanfu Ship Engineering is in charge of the construction…

The Port of New Orleans (Port NOLA) will receive $73.77 million from the federal government to assist in building the Louisiana International Terminal (LIT) project, which will provide a gateway for cargo movement on U.S. inland waterways including the Mississippi River.The U.S. Department of Transportation has alerted Congress that it intends to award this funding through its MEGA Grant Program, which will support the first phase of the overall $1.8 billion project’s construction and is in addition to significant funding commitments from private industry partners and Port NOLA.

A public-private partnership between the state of Louisiana, the Port of New Orleans and two global maritime industry leaders will build a $1.8 billion container facility on the Lower Mississippi River, Gov. John Bel Edwards announced.The new Louisiana International Terminal (LIT) in St. Bernard Parish will be able to serve vessels of all sizes, increasing Louisiana’s import and export capacity and stimulating the creation of more than 17,000 new jobs statewide by 2050, Port NOLA estimates.New Jersey-based Ports America…

Rhe Board of Commissioners of the Port of New Orleans (Port NOLA) on Thursday elected Jack C. Jensen, Jr. to serve as Board Chairman, succeeding Charles H. Ponstein, whose term as Chairman ended this month. Also elected were Joseph F. Toomy, who will serve as Vice Chairman, and Walter J. Leger, Jr., who will serve as Secretary-Treasurer for the nine-month term.“Jack Jensen has brought decades of transportation and logistics experience to this board, and we look forward to his…

The Ports of Indiana-Jeffersonville said it has completed $24 million in infrastructure enhancement projects following a $10 million Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grant received in 2015 initiating big changes in Jeffersonville. All projects were completed in 2022.The grant provided partial funding for $24 million in infrastructure enhancements that has added four miles to the port’s existing 11-mile rail network. The projects have enhanced and…

Iraq's government has agreed to sign a $2.625 billion contract with South Korea's Daewoo Engineering & Construction to build the first phase of a giant cargo port in the south of the country, a port manager said on Wednesday.The long-planned and repeatedly delayed Grand Faw port is one of several projects that Iraq hopes will create a shorter transportation corridor between the Middle East and Europe, bypassing the Suez Canal.Under the contract, expected to be signed on Sunday, Daewoo E&C will handle construction works that include building five berths to unload ships and a yard for containers

Canadian grain shipments through the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway trade corridor are up 20% in response to continuing world demand for wheat and canola, the latest figures show.Year-to-date shipments of grain (from April 1 to August 31) totaled 5.2 million tonnes, as ships transported Prairie wheat and canola and Ontario wheat and soybeans for both domestic use and for export to markets around the world.The rush of grain, which is carry over from last year’s crops, has helped to offset continuing pandemic-related declines in other key cargoes such as iron ore (down 23%)…

While St. Lawrence Seaway cargo volumes decreased during the past two months due to economic shifts related to COVID-19, industry leaders said the binational trade and transportation corridor is ready to play its part in the economic recovery efforts in the coming months. Meanwhile, with an increased focus on commodity diversification through project cargo, international shipments of wind energy components in the Great Lakes region are taking off.Overall St. Lawrence Seaway tonnage from March 15 through May 31 totaled 7.7 million metric tons, down 10% compared to the same time period in 2019.

Canadian transport minister Marc Garneau announced a five-year extension to the Government of Canada’s agreement with the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation to manage, maintain and operate the Seaway. This extends the existing agreement until March 31, 2023, and will provide stability for the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation and the marine shipping industry. A vital artery between the Great Lakes and the lower St. Lawrence River, the St. Lawrence Seaway connects the heartland of North America to the world as an important, competitive and sustainable transportation corridor. The St. Lawrence Seaway consists of 15 locks and connecting canals or channels extending from Montreal to Lake Erie. Within the Great Lakes and St.

For the second year in a row, the Port of Indiana-Jeffersonville set an annual shipping record with total cargo tonnage for 2015 exceeding the previous year's volume by nearly 16 percent. The port handled 2.8 million tons of cargo in 2015, driven by heavy volumes of agriculture and steel products. Shipments of steel more than doubled the previous record set in 2014, helped in part by rising demand in the U.S. auto industry, which sold a record 17.5 million light trucks and cars in 2015, according to Autodata Corp. Grain volume was the second highest in port history, following only the record harvest year of 2014. Port companies ship cargo to or from all 50 states and 12 countries…

Since 1985, the Port of Indiana-Jeffersonville has played an important role in handling millions of tons of steel, grain, fertilizer, salt and other bulk cargoes for both inbound and outbound markets – domestic and abroad. Located directly across the Ohio River from Louisville, Ky., the port's central location connects the Midwest to the world with the Inland Waterways System, providing year-round access to the Great Lakes as well as ocean vessels in the Gulf of Mexico that can be transloaded with barges coming from or going to Jeffersonville.

The U.S. Department of Transportation today announced the Port of Indiana-Jeffersonville will receive $10 million in TIGER Discretionary Grant money to enhance and expand the port's infrastructure. U.S. Maritime Administrator Paul "Chip" Jaenichen joined Indiana Lieutenant Governor Sue Ellspermann and port officials for the announcement at the Port of Indiana on Friday. The U.S. Department of Transportation announced that 39 projects across the U.S. will receive a total of $500 million in TIGER grant funds, including five port projects totaling $44.3 million. "The awarding of this TIGER Grant underscores the port's goal of increasing maritime commerce through domestic barge service," said Administrator Jaenichen.

The Governors of the five Upper Mississippi River States of Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri and Wisconsin are seeking President Obama’s support for critical investments in the Upper Mississippi River System as a nationally significant navigation system and a nationally significant ecosystem. In an August 20, 2014 joint letter to President Obama, the Governors expressed their ongoing commitment to the Navigation and Ecosystem Sustainability Program (NESP) authorized by Congress in 2007. NESP is an unprecedented, dual-purpose program that integrates lock capacity expansion and modernization (including seven new 1,200-foot lock chambers and several small-scale navigation efficiency measures) and ecosystem restoration efforts designed to improve the river’s ecological health.

A derelict Japanese ship dislodged by last year’s massive tsunami is drifting toward Alaska, the Coast Guard said. The shrimping vessel was floating slowly northwest in the Gulf of Alaska about 125 miles west of the nearest point of land — Forrester Island outside the Dixon Entrance, a maritime transportation corridor separating U.S. and Canada jurisdictions. The ship is heading in the direction of the south-east Alaska town of Sitka 170 miles to the north, traveling at about one mile per hour, Coast Guard spokesman David Mosley said. “Our main concern is maritime traffic,” he said.

Cantwell, Senators Urge Support for Dredging of Small Ports, Including Swinomish Channel, Port of Ilwaco. U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) has joined a group of Senators in urging key appropriators to include funding for dredging small and low-use ports in the fiscal year (FY) 2013 budget. Small and low-use ports are ports that don’t have enough tonnage to meet the Army Corps of Engineers’ threshold to qualify for annual dredging support but represent important economic engines of the communities they serve.

April 2011 marks the 200th anniversary of the key decisions for the construction of the Erie Canal, a monumental public works project that transformed the economy of New York State. Two centuries ago, on April 8, 1811, the state Legislature approved a measure that set into motion the construction of the Erie Canal. This followed the delivery of a report on March 2, 2011 of a report by the original Commission. Brian U. Stratton, Director of the New York State Canal Corporation, "Two hundred years ago, visionary New Yorkers set forth a plan which would revolutionize communication and transportation throughout a young nation, lead to unprecedented prosperity and growth, and forever establish New York the Empire State.

Twenty seven ports were recognized today for exemplary projects and initiatives at the American Association of Port Authorities (AAPA) annual Awards Luncheon, held in conjunction with AAPA’s 2003 annual convention in Curacao, Netherlands Antilles. Winners were announced in the association’s national Communications, Information Technology, Environmental Improvement and Facilities Engineering Competitions. Engraved plaques were bestowed at the ceremony upon the Port of Tacoma and the Port of Portland, winners in of this year’s Information Technology Awards; The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the Port of Portland, the Virginia Port Authority and the Port of Tacoma, winners of the Environmental Improvement Awards; the Port of Vancouver, U.S.A.

Roswitha Engert-Zöller and her husband, Capt. Albrecht Zöller, dream of riding a working towboat on the Mississippi River. But their life cruising through picturesque European villages aboard their family owned and operated power barge would be the envy of most North American mariners. The opportunities for owner-operator vessels are the norm on Europe’s inland waterways, rather than the exception as on America’s rivers. Rivers and canals have been important to the commerce of Europe since the Middle Ages. Horse drawn barges carried farm products to local markets while others helped to carry the riches of the Mediterranean and beyond to the burgers of Northern Europe.

Maersk Inc. has committed to the building of a new state-of-the-art container terminal in the Port Of Los Angeles' Pier 400 facility. The Port of Los Angeles and Maersk Inc. signed a Memorandum of Understanding, agreeing to negotiate to reach a final lease agreement. The lease agreement is subject to regulatory approval of the A.P. Moller-Maersk Line acquisition of Sea-Land International and must also be approved by the boards of A.P. Moller and Maersk Inc., the Los Angeles Harbor Commission and the Los Angeles City Council. In making the Port of Los Angeles its new West Coast hub, Maersk Sealand will bring the port about $2 billion over its 25-year lease.