Post Panamax ships to call to Halifax

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by hollistreet

The Federal Government will probably widen and dredge the St. Lawrence so Quebec can get the business.

Impractical; but in any event, your main competition for the central Canadian market won't be Montreal, it'll be New York City and Baltimore.

A lot of container traffic for Ontario already goes that way.........

[someone123]

I don't think Baltimore is as deep.

New York has the huge advantage of a big regional market with tens of millions of people. I don't think it's reasonable to expect Halifax to handle more cargo, but the fact that it could easily be #2 is still really positive.

[MonctonRad]

Baltimore is a big container port, although I don't know if it can handle post-panamax vessels or not.

In any event, Halifax's real problem is CN and the lack of double tracking to Montreal and points west. This problem doesn't exist in the urban northeast of the U.S.

The choke point isn't Halterm or the port of Halifax, it's the railway. It doesn't really matter how big or deep your harbour is............

Whatever happened to the "Atlantic Gateway"?

[halifaxboyns]

Baltimore can't take post panamax - mainly because of the canal from Montreal.

CNR will never be a help until it really gets real with it's scheduling and starts sending more smaller trains. I got caught at an intersection on my way home last night thanks to CPR because of the fact one of it's 3 mile trains was crossing. That was 15 minutes of my life I can't get back...

[fenwick16]

I think that you meant Buffalo? Baltimore should be able to take Post-Panamax size ships, as it is a major east coast port. (http://www.theterracesolution.com/20...omise-of-2014/)

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

I think that you meant Buffalo? Baltimore should be able to take Post-Panamax size ships, as it is a major east coast port. (http://www.theterracesolution.com/20...omise-of-2014/)

Absolutely right - I did mean Baltimore. Some idiots on loud motorbikes decided to play street racing all night on my street (until they finally were caught - some nice scraping marks on the street when one of them smashed into a police van).

Needless to say I didn't get much sleep and will be speaking in favour of our city's attempt to outlaw loud motorbikes!

[fenwick16]

We will give you a pass this time. I think you need an extra large Tim Horton's coffee. Or a good night's sleep.

[here4theride]

I'm still confused... Baltimore or Buffalo?

I think Baltimore will need dredging to compete for the larger post panamax ships and might eventually be restricted by the Chesapeake bat bridge/tunnel which is at 50ft. Water depth at Fairview Cove is 16.7 m / 55 ft and Sydney is planning to dredge to 17m. The largest Maersk Ship's already have a draught of 51ft. The new locks being constructed at the Panama Canal are designed to a depth of 60ft. Overall the shipping channels in Halifax Harbour have a minimum depth of 60ft so we are well positioned for future ship sizes.

[David1gray]

haha ya im confused too..... NS seems to be a fairly good position when it comes to harbour depth and bigger ships. halifax has the depth it needs, sydney is dredging to achieve a good depth, and the melford terminal i think has pretty good depth... not sure on how deep tho anyone know?

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

We will give you a pass this time. I think you need an extra large Tim Horton's coffee. Or a good night's sleep.

A bee-bee gun or a riffle would work - I'm only on the 5th floor, could pick them off as they got close to the Bow.

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by halifaxboyns

Absolutely right - I did mean Baltimore. Some idiots on loud motorbikes decided to play street racing all night on my street (until they finally were caught - some nice scraping marks on the street when one of them smashed into a police van).

Needless to say I didn't get much sleep and will be speaking in favour of our city's attempt to outlaw loud motorbikes!

Wow - I must have been out of it this afternoon too.
To clarify: Baltimore (Atlantic coast and gets post panimax container ships).
Buffalo NY (in land off the lakes) doesn't as it's along Lake Erie and post panamax container ships can't travel through the Welland Canal (as far as I know).

[fenwick16]

According to the allnovascotia.com, Halterm will be getting two new post-panamax cranes by April of next year. Also Maersk will be building 10 very large, super post-panamax ships that can each carry 18,000 TEU's. Although these won't be calling at Halifax, it will free up other super post-panamax ships in the 8,500 - 13,000 TEU size range for the Atlantic route.

There are also plans to fill in several piers at the north end of the Ocean Terminals which is the Halterm terminal - Ocean Terminals Map . Work on the 40 acre expansion won't start until 2015 - 2016 once traffic pick ups (which sounds likely according to the story).

Things are looking good for the Halifax port traffic.

[fenwick16]

There was some interesting information in a allnovascotia.com story about the Port of Halifax. Montreal can only handle container ships up to 4,000 TEUs in size whereas Halifax can handle ships up to 18,000 TEU's (super post-panamax ships). As ships continue to get larger, it certainly seems as though it will favor the Port of Halifax.

[halifaxboyns]

This is good news. Plus with the natural depth of the harbour being quite deep - it also works in Halifax's favour.

I was reading an article about some of the major ports along the US east coast and apparently they aren't ready for the next major jump in ship size and will likely have to spend billions of $ (which they don't have) to expand, while Halifax seems quite well poised to take advantage of it without too much money to be invested.

The under lying message I got from the article was that Halifax could see some spill over effect from crowding and lack of capacity in the US. The only catch will be the efficiency of the CN rail system.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by halifaxboyns

This is good news. Plus with the natural depth of the harbour being quite deep - it also works in Halifax's favour.

I was reading an article about some of the major ports along the US east coast and apparently they aren't ready for the next major jump in ship size and will likely have to spend billions of $ (which they don't have) to expand, while Halifax seems quite well poised to take advantage of it without too much money to be invested.

The under lying message I got from the article was that Halifax could see some spill over effect from crowding and lack of capacity in the US. The only catch will be the efficiency of the CN rail system.

Along with Halifax's naturally deep harbour (I sometimes forget it's the 2nd largest in the world), we also have the advantage of being a FULL DAY ahead of the U.S. ports. This is all being promoted with the Gateway; and this project's current and projected success is further fueling the political push for high speed rail!!

Halifax will definitely receive 'spill over' from U.S. ports-- but from what I've been reading Halifax is aiming to simply take their business.

[fenwick16]

There were some more details in the allnovascotia.com about the long term expansion plans to create a 3rd post-panamax berth at the Halterm south-end container terminal. The plan would involve filling in the piers between B and A1 and between A and A1 - this area. More maps and descriptions of the piers can be seen in this Port of Halifax link. Currently these berths handle break bulk traffic which would be moved to the Richmond breakbulk terminal which is currently undergoing a $73 million dollar expansion.

There is a lot of expansion occurring at the Halifax Port. There appears to be a lot of optimism for the future of the port.

[q12]

Two $10-million cranes approaching Halterm

August 21, 2013 - 11:44am BY BILL POWER BUSINESS REPORTER

thechronicleherald.ca

The arrival Friday afternoon of a couple of enormous $10-million cranes at Halterm Container Terminal Ltd., in Halifax, is expected to create quite a spectacle for harbour watchers.

Read the story here: http://thechronicleherald.ca/busines...aching-halterm

According to the story these two cranes will be the largest available in the Port of Halifax and will have the capacity to handle super post-Panamax container ships that are wide enough to carry 18 rows of containers.

[q12]

You can see the cranes on several of the Nova Scotia webcams harbour cams.

http://www.novascotiawebcams.com/hal...at-salter.html

[kph06]

Here are some I got this afternoon:

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by kph06

Here are some I got this afternoon:

That looks like it could tip over so easily with one fair sized gale. I guess they must have needed a good weather forecast before sailing.