NYK drops terminal plans in Tacoma

NYK drops terminal plans in Tacoma    The Port of Tacoma and NYK Line have dropped plans for NYK to develop a 168-acre container terminal in the port by 2012, with NYK instead calling at APM Terminals' Tacoma facility beginning the same year.
   Under an agreement approved Friday by Tacoma's port commission, the port will terminate the lease of NYK's terminal operating subsidiary for the project, Yusen Terminal Tacoma Inc., in exchange for the Japanese line agreeing to direct all independently operated Pacific Northwest calls and intermodal volume to APM Terminals' Tacoma facility for 25 years, starting from July 2012.
   “These new agreements with APMT and the Port of Tacoma, NYK and YTTI, offer us the best long-term site to house our YTTI business, and to grow our NYK business in the Pacific Northwest,' said Peter Keller, executive vice president and chief operating officer, NYK Group Americas Inc.

Keller

   West Coast maritime news service Cunningham Report reported the development Thursday.
   Tacoma's volume has dropped 15 percent this year, with a volume loss from NYK contributing to that, as the Japanese carrier moved more than 130,000 TEUs of annual volume to Seattle in 2008. The agreement should also help the APM Terminals facility, which has lost volume through the suspension of two Maersk Line transpacific services that called at the port until recently.
   “This is a very positive opportunity for us, and this kind of cooperation will help ensure the long-term growth and success of the Port of Tacoma,' said Jonathan Goldner, director of APM Terminals Tacoma.
   The decision to abandon the dedicated NYK facility hasn't come out of the blue. In July, the Tacoma News Tribune reported the port was eyeing changes to the agreement with NYK, including shifting the line to another spot in the port, or moving the volume to the APM Terminal facility.
   'What has changed is that what we originally designed for them isn't going to work,' port Executive Director Tim Farrell said at the time.
   As the port approved the cancellation of the NYK terminal, he said declining volumes in the Pacific Northwest have shifted priorities away from capacity expansion.
   “In a market with sufficient existing terminal capacity to serve our customers' growth plans in the medium term, this is an important step to balance supply and demand,” Farrell said. “It still leaves the Port of Tacoma with room for substantial growth in the longer term.'
   Both port and NYK executives said in July that the proposed project was likely to at least be scaled back due to slackening container volumes and the rising cost of the development.