Misc General Banter Thread

[SD]

Fair enough. Any thoughts on if improving 95 in SC could benefit the port of Charleston? (specifically to help compete with other regional ports)

Yes and no, they opened the Leatherman terminal it bled money so they consolidated back to Wando and North Charleston. They have some struggles with the largest of the vessels having to be tide dependent with the biggest vessels getting to Wando and there is a 100% height restriction getting to North Charleston. There are also some transit time limitations with Charleston, we do about 750 containers through Charleston per year but if we have a container that is time sensitive we book it to Norfolk and save about 2 weeks. 95 improvements would help once they are at port, we had to move our container delivery time to evening because the drivers hated getting to and off port in the morning with the congestion and traffic.

 

[YetAnotherRDUGuy]

Yes and no, they opened the Leatherman terminal it bled money so they consolidated back to Wando and North Charleston. They have some struggles with the largest of the vessels having to be tide dependent with the biggest vessels getting to Wando and there is a 100% height restriction getting to North Charleston. There are also some transit time limitations with Charleston, we do about 750 containers through Charleston per year but if we have a container that is time sensitive we book it to Norfolk and save about 2 weeks. 95 improvements would help once they are at port, we had to move our container delivery time to evening because the drivers hated getting to and off port in the morning with the congestion and traffic.

Alright SD, tell me you know logistics without specifically telling me you know logistics.

But seriously though, I figured Norfolk/Hampton Roads was quicker to here but not by 2 weeks. (!) I assume Charleston's cheaper due to container volume you cited. So basically improving 95 in SC wouldn't significantly improve distribution to here. (not enough to justify costs at least)

You get anything from Wilmington btw? (I suspect not much)

 

[Tarheel1]

Memories….. a Christmas gift from Storm 5

 

[SD]

Alright SD, tell me you know logistics without specifically telling me you know logistics.

But seriously though, I figured Norfolk/Hampton Roads was quicker to here but not by 2 weeks. (!) I assume Charleston's cheaper due to container volume you cited. So basically improving 95 in SC wouldn't significantly improve distribution to here. (not enough to justify costs at least)

You get anything from Wilmington btw? (I suspect not much)

We can get some direct routes from Asia to Norfolk that we can't get to CHS so that saves quite a bit on transit time also the reverse transit through the Suez to ORF vs through the Panama canal can be a time saver.

Not much through ILM, thats gradually being phased to CHS, I will say though if you are importing from South/Central America ILM is a great option

 

[ChrisAMB]

Fair enough. Any thoughts on if improving 95 in SC could benefit the port of Charleston? (specifically to help compete with other regional ports)

No. More rail links are needed more than traffic lanes. Go south and Savannah/Brunswick are your primary ports. Go north and you have Wilmington and soon to be an expanded Morehead City. Those two are more bulk than container though. Charleston will continue to serve the corridor up 26 and 77. At some point I would think the federal government would look at rehabbing the port in Georgetown as it's less vulnerable to sea level rise and to take pressure off Charleston especially if there's a navy expansion down there. Charleston will always get the bigger ships as the channel is maintained deeper, but Georgetown could take a lot of the smaller ones. It might wind up being cheaper than the infrastructure improvements needed in and around Charleston not to mention a hedge against the seismic hazard in Charleston.

It would be rebuilding from scratch essentially but I have my doubts the city/county will ever actually do anything worthwhile with the site. There will always be a need for bulk transport of materials and keeping the option open just seems wise for future climate resilience.

 

[ChrisAMB]

We can get some direct routes from Asia to Norfolk that we can't get to CHS so that saves quite a bit on transit time also the reverse transit through the Suez to ORF vs through the Panama canal can be a time saver.

Not much through ILM, thats gradually being phased to CHS, I will say though if you are importing from South/Central America ILM is a great option

Bizarrely I've seen/heard of a decent amount of stuff going from Wilmington to Australia/Oceana.

 

[ChrisAMB]

Yes and no, they opened the Leatherman terminal it bled money so they consolidated back to Wando and North Charleston. They have some struggles with the largest of the vessels having to be tide dependent with the biggest vessels getting to Wando and there is a 100% height restriction getting to North Charleston. There are also some transit time limitations with Charleston, we do about 750 containers through Charleston per year but if we have a container that is time sensitive we book it to Norfolk and save about 2 weeks. 95 improvements would help once they are at port, we had to move our container delivery time to evening because the drivers hated getting to and off port in the morning with the congestion and traffic.

The new port and associated infrastructure has been a massive cluster ****. I think the only thing moving down there right now is the new Coast Guard stuff on the other side of the FLETC. There's still some development occurring a bit up the river around the old Navy yard but that's always been questionable with the amount of tidal flooding over land.