With the newly expanded Panama Canal set to open in 3 weeks, the ports of NY/NJ surprisingly may not be able to accommodate the 14,000 TEU ships that the canal will be able to handle. According to the Journal of Commerce*,
…until the $1.3 billion project to raise the Bayonne Bridge between New Jersey and Staten Island is completed next year, carriers will have to wait to send 12,000-TEU ships to the Port of New York and New Jersey’s four biggest container terminals. And now they may have to wait longer while the Army Corps of Engineers studies whether the Arthur Kill turning basin can handle ships of that size.
This will have an impact on other East Coast ports:
The chiefs of many East Coast gateway ports say they are ready to handle 12,000-TEU-plus ships, but carriers won’t be able to deploy ships of this size on rotations that call New York-New Jersey until they know the Arthur Kill turning basin can handle them.
Full story here.*