The Port of New York /New Jersey is busy building for the next surge in box cargo with channel deepening and addressing of the Bayonne Bridge. But the real key is a strong port rotation that looks to pump up numbers, even in the short term. By Paul Richardson, AJOT According to the latest statistics for container volumes handled by the Port of New York and New Jersey, 2012 throughput is expected to rise around 4.5% on last year. During 2011, the port handled 5.5m teu, with the number of loaded import containers up 4% on 2010 to reach just over 1.56m teu, and loaded export containers up 6.6% to reach a little under 920,000 teu over the same timeframe. With the US economy showing real positive signs of an upsurge, the port is also readying itself for further volume expansion with a channel deepening program that will enable vessels up to 50ft in draught, to safely enter the terminals at Newark, Elizabeth and New Jersey, as well as the New York Container Terminal. Work on the channel deepening program for Newark, Elizabeth and New Jersey should be completed by the end of 2012, while 2014 is being set as a completion for the New York Container Terminal. Within the ambitious planning program for the future, the Port Authority is also moving ahead with its design and development portfolio on the Bayonne Bridge by raising the roadway some 60ft to allow post-panamax vessels to serve the western harbor terminals. Much has been said about the widening of the lock systems of the Panama Canal from the present 32.2m to accommodate larger capacity, and work is progressing satisfactorily on this restructuring. But while that moves ahead, then another all water route covering the Asia/US East Coast trade is continuing to show its true potential, and this one does not have a capacity restriction – the Suez Canal. Right now there are no less than six all water services covering the Asia/USEC via Suez trade and that is almost 30% of the total all water Asia/USEC services covering this trade. New York’s geographical position obviously lends itself to providing prime potential for inclusion of the Suez route services, and of those six services, five call at New York, and all of them make this the first port call inbound from Asia. The Suez route potential also lends itself perfectly to the fast developing southeast Asia market growth, particularly over countries such as Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia, and obviously on the back of this, is the transshipment business over Singapore, Port Kelang and Tanjung Pelepas. To serve these trades using the Panama Canal route would add more than a week to the inbound transit times into ports such as New York. Heading up the league of names covering the Asia/USEC via Suez trade are obviously Maersk, Mediterranean Shipping Co (MSC) and CMA-CGM. Maersk and CMA-CGM are teamed up to jointly operate the TP3/Columbus service, while Mediterranean Shipping Co have retained their usual independent status, and operate the Golden Gate service. Both services were launched back in mid-2009, within weeks between the official inauguration dates. Each operates with an average weekly capacity of around 8,500 teu and at that level, is ahead of the other lines using the Suez route, and obviously almost double the available service capacity that can be deployed via the Panama Canal. Since the inception of these services, capacity has been progressively been increased, but only in a way responsive to market demand from around 6,000 teu up to the present level. Transit times from Shanghai into New York on the TP3/Columbus service is presently 31 days, while the MSC Golden Gate service, Yantian/New York is just 28 days. Over recent weeks there has been a restructuring of one particular service using the Suez route, and that is the old-styled CKYH/MOL (Mitsui-OSK) AWE4/SVS service, which effectively meant a split of the two lines’ service, and a newcomer, Evergreen arriving on the scene. On the resultant CKYH AWE4 service that MOL leaves at the end of May, capacity deployment