JaxPort considers scaled-back, cheaper dredging plan

[thelakelander]

JaxPort officials have quietly crafted a scaled-back option to dredge the St. Johns River that comes with a smaller price tag but would also fall short of delivering a deeper channel to the TraPac terminal, Jacksonville's best window to Asian trade and the mega ships it will bring.
The trimmed option — according to public records and confirmed by JaxPort officials last week — would reduce the original 13-mile dredge to 11 miles, slashing the overall cost from more than $700 million to about $511 million, which JaxPort officials believe could make it a more enticing investment as they lobby the federal government to share the cost.

But the proposal also adds layers of uncertainties: Tenants, including TraPac, would have to be shuffled between terminals, meaning JaxPort could face a sensitive and potentially difficult series of agreements and balancing acts.

With rival ports along the East Coast scrambling to compete for larger and larger cargo ships that need deeper harbors, finding money and starting the project to deepen the river from 40 feet to 47 feet as quickly as possible has become increasingly urgent. Jacksonville is already behind Miami and Savannah in port deepening.

The proposed 11-mile dredge is, at this stage, only an option JaxPort is exploring.

Full article: http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2015-07-11/story/pursuit-federal-money-jaxport-considers-scaled-back-cheaper-dredging


This modified plan sounds pretty similar to what Gulftainer proposed back in 2012. At the time, the local response was "we're not interested."

The Jacksonville Port Authority has turned down a proposal by an international shipping firm seeking to lease 100 acres at Blount Island for a cargo terminal that would have been one of the port's biggest.
Gulftainer Co. Ltd. also said it would spend around $250 million in Jacksonville if it built a terminal here, according to state Rep. Mike Weinstein.

But JaxPort officials notified Gulftainer this week the company's proposal does not fit into the authority's plans.

The 754-acre Blount Island, east of the Dames Point bridge, is occupied by existing tenants. JaxPort officials said the authority is in the early stages of putting together a strategic plan for developing all the port authority's property.

Weinstein, R-Jacksonville, said JaxPort missed an opportunity because Gulftainer considered Jacksonville its No. 1 choice. He said the port should have looked for ways to accommodate Gulftainer's needs by possibly moving some tenants from Blount Island to other port-owned property.

"This was their first choice and if they don't come here, they're going to take that same level of investment and [cargo] tonnage somewhere else on the East Coast," he said. "It won't be Florida. We're the only Florida port Gulftainer was considering.

Weinstein said Gulftainer told him the $250 million would pay for projects such as new cranes, helping to foot the bill for deepening the ship channel and raising the JEA power line spanning the river to allow passage of bigger cargo container ships.

He said given the magnitude of Gulftainer's proposal, he's disappointed the port didn't vigorously enter into negotiations.

Gulftainer "brought in a half dozen people from all over the world to make this presentation, and all they got back was a fax saying we're not interested," Weinstein said.

Full article: http://jacksonville.com/business/2012-06-01/story/jaxport-turns-down-250-million-deal

[Ocklawaha]

Here we go again, the classical  'We can't have Disney so lets built a ferris wheel,' approach.

[tufsu1]

Here we go again, the classical  'We can't have Disney so lets built a ferris wheel,' approach.

except this time the vast majority of citizens aren't at all interested in having Disney

[Ocklawaha]

No but when the worlds shipping is too big for our port and we get bypassed, watch them howl!

[UNFurbanist]

I thought that the idea in Folio was interesting. http://folioweekly.com/LETS-NOT-DREDGE-THE-RIVER,12941

[I-10east]

I'm surprised that they didn't say "19 Things we should do instead of dredging the river". Gotta love Folio's award winning journalism....

[Ocklawaha]

Well I (and the rest of the railroad industry) might have been with him on the Jetty area terminals and rail line but when he crossed over to the south side of the river and brought in rail car barges, we all fell off the train laughing. Yes it WAS done and still is in a few remote locations... And NO it won't be done again anytime soon! Keep it north of the river and its a great and workable idea.

[The_Choose_1]

I'm proud that Jaxport has figured this out. We can never dredge the St Johns River to fit the largest cargo ships like the Barzan ship https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barzan_%28ship%29 and why should we.

The port of Jacksonville is relevant, although it may not be for the reasons you'd think.

While the port is scrambling to deepen the shipping channel in preparation for larger ships brought by the Panama Canal expansion, K.C. Conway, a port analyst and senior vice president for credit risk management at SunTrust Bank, argued that there are other, equally important ingredients to port success.

Jacksonville happens to excel at many of them."If you ask Volkswagen and Maersk if Jacksonville is relevant, the answer is yes," Conway said, referring to the major investments both companies made to Jacksonville this year.

Conway's claim is that the supply chain is changing drastically. Yes, Southern California is the nexus for most port and supply chain activity, but that is shifting to the East Coast, where 70 percent of the nation's population lives.

And while having a deeper port wouldn't hurt Jacksonville, Conway said, lacking a deep port is not a deal breaker: The nation's fourth-busiest port, Savannah, is also one of the shallowest.

That doesn't mean to let up on the issue.

"Keep pressure on your Legislature," Conway told the Business Journal after his presentation at a NAIOP luncheon, "and keep your options open. But it's really everything else you're doing."

That everything else includes major issues in the supply chain, including the growth of on-shoring, either to Mexico or even to the United States. That could shift freight from the West Coast, which specializes in Asia trade. In fact, Conway said, freight could start moving from the Western Hemisphere as more and more goods are manufactured in North America.

Other innovations, such as Jacksonville's energy market, will be a huge game changer: As ships adopt liquefied natural gas, Jacksonville is one of the leading, and only, fuel stops.

"If you're the gas station," Conway said, "you will be a key link." Florida has really had the potential to be a supply chain hub for a long time. Not only does it have the fourth-largest share of the country's GDP, but it's in the Southeast, the largest growing region in the country.

Conway said Florida counts for much more than some might think.

"If you put all of Florida's TEUs [twenty-foot-equivalent unit containers] together, you would have more than the No. 3 port, New York," Conway said. "You just have to work synergistically and determine what's of strategic importance."

And for that, he said, Jacksonville has a strong argument.

"You have to rank ports differently," he said. "Look at what ports are luring new users and expanding shipping service. If you look at VW and Maersk, they say Jacksonville. If Jacksonville is so insignificant, why did they choose it?" http://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2015/06/23/responding-to-criticisms-outside-economist-says.html?ana=twt

[thelakelander]

Great points by Conway, concerning "everything else" other than dredging for the largest ships. Another interesting observation is the one about combining all of Florida's TEUs together is more than NY's port. Perhaps, it's not the end of the world if Miami's channel is 50 ft and ours is not.

[The_Choose_1]

Great points by Conway, concerning "everything else" other than dredging for the largest ships. Another interesting observation is the one about combining all of Florida's TEUs together is more than NY's port. Perhaps, it's not the end of the world if Miami's channel is 50 ft and ours is not.

Of course it's NOT! We could also have more smaller ships come in for loads to deliver goods fastest to islands in the Caribbean. Lets have the cargo that comes by Semi stop here in Jacksonville Florida. Instead of driving it to Miami to be shipped out. Jaxport isn't dying anytime soon. I also don't want the St Johns River to be so screwed up that fishing takes a major hit.

[The_Choose_1]

No but when the worlds shipping is too big for our port and we get bypassed, watch them howl!

We and you just need to adjust to a scaled down port. And Screw the other Ports. Even if we could dredge the St Johns River to 50 feet we still couldn't get a lot of these ships in. The dames Port Bridge would have to be moved up. God what a waste of money this all would be. Just because we can't be like Savannah, Charleston, Miami etc etc etc. Who Cares.

[Tacachale]

We're in this position because of lack of local leadership on the port question. It's a rare case where the state and our federal reps have been on top of it and our own leaders haven't. Florida has too many ports and it needs to pick winners and losers. With our location and rail connection, there's absolutely no reason we should be one of the losers.

[The_Choose_1]

We're in this position because of lack of local leadership on the port question. It's a rare case where the state and our federal reps have been on top of it and our own leaders haven't. Florida has too many ports and it needs to pick winners and losers. With our location and rail connection, there's absolutely no reason we should be one of the losers.

BS we are not losers. JAXPORT exports more automobiles then anybody else including Miami. We are the Winners!

[thelakelander]

We're losers when it comes to dredging. Dredging is already underway in Miami.

[Tacachale]

Miami isn't really what we're competing with. Miami's worth doing because the metro itself is so huge, but it's stupid to ship nationwide cargo there (you'd have to put it on trucks and trains and take it through Jacksonville anyway). My understanding is that for its portion, the state is/would be committed to both projects, but our local leadership at the city and the port have dropped the ball. Our real competition for outgoing cargo is Savannah and Charleston; if we can quit tripping over our own two feet, we can compete with those.