Following on the heels of an excellent 2014, where the facilities of the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority (PRPA) experienced their fifth consecutive year of double-digit growth, recently-compiled cargo figures for the first-quarter of this year indicate that an equally or even more impressive 2015 is a very strong likelihood for the Port of Philadelphia.
In addition to overall cargo increases in broad categories such as containers, breakbulk, liquid bulk, etc., for the first time in recent history every major cargo category that the statistical process counts, which includes containers, steel, forest products, cocoa beans, project cargo, ro/ro, liquid bulk, and other/miscellaneous cargoes, all showed increases, with no exceptions.
Containers showed healthy gains in the first quarter when counted either as TEU’s or tonnage. 100,203 TEU’s were handled during the first quarter of 2015 compared to the 97,922 TEU’s handled during the same period of 2014, a 2.33 percent gain.
Counted as tonnage, 684,360 metric tons of containerized cargo was moved during January-March 2015 compared to the 646,621 metric tons moved during that same period of 2014, resulting in a 5.84 percent gain.
These current cargo increases, which continue a trend of growth that began over five years ago, are occurring during an exciting time for the Port of Philadelphia, as the Port’s 45-foot Main Channel Deepening project nears completion, and the PRPA Board of Directors is overseeing the advancement of the Port’s Southport Project, which will result in one or more major new maritime operations in South Philadelphia, the first entirely new operations added to the Port in more than a generation.
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