Though ports face a variety of issues on a daily basis, two issues cut to the heart of our business and will continue to do so in 2016. I call them the two Cs: congestion and capacity. To varying degrees, all ports face one or both of these issues as we work to handle cargo as efficiently as possible. Fortunately, the former isn’t a big problem at our port. Many ports, however, have serious issues with congestion, and they need to be addressed. A port with a line of vessels at anchorage, waiting to discharge their cargoes, is a nightmare no one wants to face.
Capacity, or having the room to grow, is the other problem the industry will continue to face. It concerned us greatly in our own region, so we made it a point to do something about it. There was underutilized waterfront land in our region, and we worked for years to legally secure it. Now, with land secured and projects on the drawing board, we hope to be ready for the new vessels our region will soon see as a result of an expanded Panama Canal and a deeper main shipping channel , dredging for which is almost complete.
But what about those ports that simply don’t have extra land in which to grow? That is going to be a problem, as international trade is again booming. Does a port with no room to grow put the brakes on aggressive marketing and just concentrate on existing business? There are difficult questions for ports in that position.
We have our challenges as we move forward, but I’m glad the two Cs are currently not among our larger ones.
James T. McDermott Jr., Executive Director, Philadelphia Regional Port Authority