by MARK AREND mark.arend bounce@conway.com

Post-Panamax ships, like these Overseas Orient Container Line vessels, will be more frequent visitors to the Port of Halifax in the months and years ahead, thanks to congestion at ports on the North American west coast.

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he Port of Halifax belongs to an elite group of ports that will only grow in importance as global shipping transitions to larger vessels. Their role as regional logistics hubs, therefore, will take on new significance, particularly as many ports approach or reach their capacity to handle cargo. This is particularly true of ports on the North American west coast. Back east, Halifax, Nova Scotia, boasts a port that can handle so- called post- Panamax vessels — those too large to use the Panama Canal — without undergoing dredging and other modifications. These ships typically carry 4,500 or more containers, while their predecessors carry about 3,000 at full capacity.
   The first such vessel to visit Halifax, the 5,400-TEU (twenty- foot equivalent units) OOCL Chicago operated by the Orient Overseas Container Line, called on the port in January 2006. Its other destinations include Hong Kong, Singapore and New York. The line's other slightly smaller ships also will be regular visitors to the port.
   Infrastructure to service this next generation of cargo operations at the Port of Halifax already is taking shape. On February 3, Consolidated Fastfrate announced a new, 90,000-sq.-ft. (8,300-sq.-m.) transload, cargo distribution and warehouse facility at nearby Burnside Industrial Park. A second phase, adding about 60,000 sq. ft. (5,600 sq. m.) will likely be built within two years. The facility will create about 180 jobs, not counting those created to truck the freight to its destinations in Canada and the USA.
   "Currently, we transload approximately 20,000 containers a year in Vancouver, and we expect to replicate that service in Halifax, making Fastfrate the only company working the east and west coasts of Canada," noted Ron Tepper, the company's president and CEO, at the project announcement.