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A portion of the former Charleston Naval Base is being transformed into a new container terminal by the S.C. State Ports Authority.
By Shelia Watson
Contributing Writer
The large blue and white cranes that rise over Charleston’s waterfront on the Cooper River are more than constant reminders of the maritime history that links South Carolina’s past to its economic future.
When each of the cranes at the Wando-Welch Terminal East of the Cooper is in the horizontal position — the “working” position that allows cranes to move containers on and off the ships — it means there is work being done at the port.
Lately, more often than in recent years, the cranes have been at a vertical angle, idle and waiting for the ships to come in — a testament to current economic woes and the resulting slowdown in TEUs, or 20-foot equivalent unit containers, moving through the port. In January of this year, the SPA reported a decrease of 11% in container volume, from 1.97 million TEUs in 2006 to 1.75 million TEUs in 2007.
The S.C. State Ports Authority attributes the decrease in volume to a number of factors — weakness in the European trade lanes, decline in shipment of housing-related commodities and consolidations in the shipping industry. But the SPA’s eyes are fixed on the future. And they have set their sights far enough ahead to see the days of horizontal “working” cranes as a constant at each of the SPA terminals, with the port at full capacity.
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