Last year, Ports America Chesapeake (PAC) a subsidiary Iselin, N.J-based Ports America, inked a 50-year lease & concession on Baltimore’s Seagirt Terminal in the Port of Baltimore. The deal includes the construction of a berth with 50-feet of water alongside. This makes the Port of Baltimore, one of two East Coast ports with a 50-foot depth channel and a 50-foot berth. With the widening of the Panama Canal scheduled for completion by, 2014, and more Suez traffic on the way, as PAC President & CEO Mark Montgomery, remarked, “the Port of Baltimore is prepared” for super-post Panamax era.By George Lauriat, Editor-in-Chief, AJOTMark Montgomery, President & CEO for PAC (Ports America Chesapeake), a subsidiary of is keenly aware of the position of the Port of Baltimore some 150-miles up the Chesapeake Bay. For many years, that position was considered a disadvantage but with a 50-foot channel and Seagirt’s 50-foot berth “We’re 150 miles closer to the people, the 4th largest consumer market and 2nd in household income (behind San Francisco-Oakland) in the US,” Montgomery explained. The trip up the Chesapeake brings the boxships 150 miles closer to the consumer market, which is important for another reason; “it (the berths) reduces the carbon footprint,” Montgomery said. Being able to move super post-Panamax size boxships into the metro area reduces truck traffic and consequently significantly cuts carbon emissions. Added to this is the fact that Seagirt terminal feeds CSX’s rail line to the mid-West, further reducing the carbon footprint. The Deal Back in December of 2009, The Maryland Board of Public Works and Ports America Chesapeake (PAC), a subsidiary of Ports America inked a 50-year lease and concession agreement to operate the Seagirt Marine Terminal in the Port of Baltimore. A few weeks later in early January 2010, Baltimore, PAC successfully concluded the lease and concession agreement with the State of Maryland. Under the agreement, Ports America is responsible for running the daily operations of the Seagirt Marine Terminal, as well as investing in a new 50-foot berth (Berth IV), cranes, and other infrastructure at 200-acre Seagirt. Ports America will make an annual payment of $3.2 million and provide ongoing revenues to the Maryland Port Authority (MPA) and is projected to pay $15.7 million in taxes to the State. Under the terms of the agreement the Maryland Transportation Authority (MTA), immediately received a payment of around $100 million to be put toward related infrastructure and transportation projects. Maryland’s Governor Martin O’Malley, Governor of Maryland noted that “With this agreement, we are able to secure the Port’s long-term future with a 50-foot berth, apply an immediate influx of capital for system preservation of roads, tunnels, and bridges, and provide an extended revenue stream to the State [Maryland].” Maryland’s public officials are already very pleased with the State’s first public-private port venture. On one hand the Ports America deal provided the private capital for the project that the State would have had a hard time raising and with the bonus that the facility will be better then the one initially drawn up. Originally, the contract called for Ports America was to have the berth built and two container cranes located on the berth by July 2014 and then build out the two super post-Panamax berths two years later. But Ports America used the slump in the construction business to accelerate the program and the program broke ground in March 2010. The stevedoring firm was able to secure favorable prices on the gantry cranes from China’s ZPMC, and thus increased the total from two super post-Panamax cranes to four cranes. Montgomery explained that there another reason for accelerating the construction of the berths. He said that they wanted to have the berths open and functioning “before” the Panama Canal; “We didn’t want a ‘build it and they will come strategy’ with the carriers but rather a it’s built and we’re