Coal leads strong year for portJan 14 - McClatchy-Tribune Content Agency, LLC - David Patch The Blade, Toledo, Ohio
Rising coal traffic in 2014 helped push the port of Toledo to its best cargo volume in seven years, while more freight crossed the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority's general-cargo docks last year than had since 2000. Overall cargo tonnage was up by 19.55 percent, to 11,653,430 tons from last year's 9,748,078 tons, and Joe Cappel, the port authority's vice president of business development, noted that all cargo categories posted increases. "Nearly 20 percent [growth] is really an indication of good things happening," Mr. Cappel said Tuesday. The general-cargo volume of 301,011 tons was nearly double the 2013 total, and Mr. Cappel said its growth was driven by steel imports crossing Toledo's docks, primarily from Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., and Italy. While one of the smaller cargo categories by weight, the general and miscellaneous category is among the bigger revenue generators for the port, and those cargoes typically generate more work for longshoremen than bulk commodities, whose handling is heavily mechanized. Toledo's imported steel is typically trucked to various processing companies in the area, with much of it later consumed by the auto industry, he said. Other major elements of the port's general cargo last year included bagged calcium nitrate, sugar, aluminum, and heavy machinery, Mr. Cappel said. Those imports' growth put more ocean-going ships into the Great Lakes-Seaway System, which in turn meant more ships were available to haul grain out of the region for export. Toledo's waterborne grain business grew 19.3 percent last year, to 1,582,756 tons from 1,326,738 in 2013. In 2009, at the recession's depths, just nine ocean-going ships visited during the entire shipping season, compared with 47 tallied last year. Domestic steel production also boosted Toledo's port traffic last year, although the 3.64 percent increase in taconite ore traffic at the CSX Lakefront Dock was the smallest rise among cargo sectors. The biggest gain by weight was in coal, which increased by 37 percent to 3,491,719 -- the port's highest coal number in three years. Toledo's newest riverfront terminal, Ironville Dock, handled 277,000 tons of crushed stone, most of it ballast rock for the Norfolk Southern railroad, Mr. Cappel said. Ironville also has been involved with rail-truck transfer of petroleum products that don't appear in the seaport statistics because marine transport isn't involved. The $23 million that the port authority and its stevedore, Midwest Terminals of Toledo, spent between 2008 and last year to acquire and develop the Ironville site was among projects cited in supporting documents accompanying a new survey of Great Lakes port investments. The joint American Great Lakes Port Association and Canadian Chamber of Marine Commerce survey reported $4.7 billion in public and private spending on ships, ports, and waterway infrastructure between 2009 and 2013. Another $2.2 billion has been committed for such projects going forward. Such spending includes nearly $4 billion to replace or improve ships that operate on the Great Lakes, with Canadian-flag vessel operators accounting for $2.23 billion of that. American ship lines' capital investment is a relatively small $334 million, with foreign-flag operators of Seaway-size ships accounting for the rest. Contact David Patch at: dpatch@theblade.com or 419-724-6094. http://www.energycentral.com/functional/news/news_detail.cfm?did=34889386& |