Lone Star ports take aim at China trade
Two very different ports in Texas are both aiming to build their China trade in different ways as Southwest Texas starts to emerge as a niche opportunity for exporters. Leading this is the Port of Corpus Christi (POCC).
Located on the western Gulf of Mexico, Corpus Christi is the US’s sixth largest seaport in terms of total tonnage. It also has some impressive facilities, including a 45 ft deep channel, 125 acres of storage and fabrication sites as well as shipside rail and truck access.
These rail and road access are its strong points as they provide direct connections to three Class 1 railways and the American road network. POCC plans to build on this with the La Quinta Trade Gateway Terminal Project.
La Quinta is a major part of POCC’s planned long-term development. Covering 1,100 acres, when it is finished it will provide a state-of-the-art multi-purpose dock and container facility. The dock will have three berths with nine ship-to-shore cranes, 180 acres of container/cargo storage yard and 400 acres for on-site distribution and warehousing. It will all connect to the roads and rail, the latter via an on-site railway.
The facility will have an annual handling capacity of one million TEUs.
“We hope to open our China container trade after the Panama Canal is expanded in late 2014. We would expect to see 50,000 to 100,000 TEUs by 2016,” John LaRue, executive director of the Port of Corpus Christi Authority told Cargonews Asia. “I can confirm that the Asian carriers and terminal operators I met with felt they would call in the Gulf of Mexico with their mega-vessels in the short and near term.”
LaRue’s view is the Gulf ports will gain from transhipment with the mega-vessels heading straight for larger ports further afield such as New York. “There is going to be a market there,” he said.
This is not the only port in Texas making a pitch for China trade, even if it is taking the longer term view. The Port of San Antonio is looking to go international with Asia a top priority.
Using the land surrounding former Kelly Air Force Base as a cargo airport, the Port of San Antonio is a growing commercial centre and multimodal logistics platform that is not on the coast.
San Antonio not only has Kelly Field airport, (SKF) but a railport (East Kelly Railport), which has access to two Class 1 railroads (BNSF Railway and Union Pacific) as well as extensive road connections. With similar connectivity assets as the Port of Corpus Christi the two coordinate well – they also coordinate with Laredo on the Mexican border.
“We are working on trying to connect lift out of China to Mexico,” said Bruce Miller, president and chief executive officer of the Port of San Antonio at a recent conference in Bangkok.
This would give shippers a way to avoid capacity and regulatory problems in Mexico and more options for moving goods onwards, Jorge Canavati, vice-president for business development told Cargonews Asia.
“The Port of San Antonio is in the process of designing an air cargo service between China and Mexico through Kelly Field Airport,” said Canavati. “We have the feeder connections which could be air or road to different parts of Mexico and the United States.”
“We say China but it could be Taiwan or other areas in Asia but a lot depends on Mexican regulations,” he added.
Currently the facility is doing some charter cargo to the Mexican city of Guadalajara and other emerging Latin American cities.