Port of Virginia records 8.6% box gain in Sept.

But cargo growth represents a mixed blessing for the port authority.    The Port of Virginia posted another month of strong cargo numbers in September, but profits were weak.   
   In September, container volume increased 8.6 percent, or 15,928 shipping units, from a year earlier to 201,113 TEUs. The growth was largely driven by a 12-percent increase in export containers, or 12,080 TEUs. It is the fifth month this calendar year that the port has exceeded 200,000 TEUs.  
   Last year, the Port of Virginia set a throughput record of 2.22 million TEUs. Year-to-date, the port is tracking 7.1-percent ahead of the same period in 2013 at 1.76 million TEUs, according to port authority figures released Thursday.    
   Virginia was slower than other ports recovering volumes after the recession, but has bounced back the past couple years to become one of the fastest growing ports on the East Coast. The sixth largest container port in the United States has averaged 6.5 percent volume growth since 2010. Put another way, container throughput has grown 25 percent to 30 percent in a short period of time.  
   The port’s two primary container terminals have gone from 70 percent utilization to more than 90 percent during that time, John Reinhart, the Virginia Port Authority’s new chief executive officer, recently told a reporter.
   All the new business has come with a downside: poor terminal productivity servicing truck drivers due to inadequate equipment, staffing levels and processes. Reinhart admitted earlier this month at a Federal Maritime Commission meeting that the port didn’t invest enough on landside systems to smoothly handle cargo growth.  
   Virginia operates its own terminals rather than contracting with private companies.
   September’s truck volume increased 21.9 percent to 76,782 moves, up 13,359 from last September. Year-to-date, containers moved by truck have increased 8.6 percent.
   Reinhart ordered gates kept open for truckers on weekends after arriving in Norfolk early this year, but extending gate hours and taking other emergency measures is expensive. The port blamed the extra overhead plus reduced per-box revenue, as annual volume incentives for ocean carriers kicked in, for the small operating profit of $103,000.   
   The port generated an operating profit in the first three months of fiscal year 2015, beginning in July, and in six of the last seven months. First quarter income was $4.3 million, compared with an operating loss of $3.4 million for same quarter the previous year.   
   That is an improvement from recent years. Between 2011 and 2013, the VPA had operating losses of $63.7 million. If not for annual contributions of about $35 million from the state transportation trust fund, the port authority’s net income would have been in the red during that period.  
   “The heavy volumes and profitability continue, but our delivery of service to the motor carriers is not acceptable,” Reinhart said in a statement. “We are pushing our capacity limits at both Virginia International Gateway (previously APM Terminals) and Norfolk International Terminal.”   
   More than a third of cargo at the two terminals arrives and departs by rail, one of the highest ratios in the nation. Reinhart said the same level of efficiency at the rail ramps needs to be achieved at the truck gates.  
   Breakbulk tonnage — oversize equipment, automobiles, steel — grew 20.5 percent in September to 20,951 tons and is up 1.2 percent for the first nine months of the year to 263,828 tons. General cargo is primarily handled at the Newport News Terminal.
   Year-to-date, rail volume is up 4.4 percent. Ship calls for the year are up 3 percent to 167 vessels.