Officials said the new container terminal will give Baltimore’s port a substantial competitive advantage up and down the Eastern Seaboard.
By Lorraine Mirabella, Baltimore Sun
A sprawling new container terminal will be built at Tradepoint Atlantic, the logistics hub on the former site of Bethlehem Steel in Sparrows Point, easing capacity issues and boosting potential growth for the Port of Baltimore.
Tradepoint Atlantic announced a joint investment and partnership Tuesday with developer Terminal Investment Limited to create the 165-acre terminal with an on-dock rail facility at Coke Point. It is expected to employ about 1,000 people.
“This is one of the most important and consequential announcements we have made since setting out with our initial plans to redevelop the former Sparrows Point Steel Mill,” said Kerry Doyle, managing director of Tradepoint Atlantic, in an announcement.
Terminal Investment Limited is a Switzerland-based company owned by the shipping giant Mediterranean Shipping Co., one of the world’s largest operators of container ships and the Port of Baltimore’s largest shipping line.
While officials declined to disclose how much was being invested in the terminal, similar facilities run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. They also said it was a multiyear project and didn’t say when it might open.
The plans represent the next major phase of development at the 3,300-acre industrial center that has attracted more than 20 companies, such as Amazon, Under Armour, FedEx, BMW, and Volkswagen. The project is expected to create hundreds of other jobs throughout the permitting and construction process.
The container terminal would be the second built in the past decade in the United States, where ports have been experiencing congestion amid surging global trade. The other opened in Charleston, South Carolina, last year.
Officials said the new container terminal will give Baltimore’s port a substantial competitive advantage up and down the Eastern Seaboard.
The investment will create much-needed additional container-handling capacity in Baltimore and help drive economic growth, Ammar Kanaan, CEO of Terminal Investment Limited, said in the announcement.
“At the same time, we are confident that the new container terminal will constitute an important contribution to the development of Baltimore as a gateway for intermodal transport,” Kanaan said.
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