7 January 2005

Record year for Montreal boxes

The following article is excerpted from the 6 January 2005 edition of “The Journal of Commerce”.

The Port of Montreal (schedules) enjoyed its strongest year in two decades in 2004, led by record-breaking container volume, and port officials expect "across the board" increases in container and bulk shipments in 2005.

"'It was a very good year,' you know, the Sinatra song," said Dominic Taddeo, president and chief executive of the Montreal Port Authority….

Total volume exceeded 23 million metric tones in 2004, up 12.2 percent from the previous year and the highest total since 24.8 million tons in 1984, when Montreal handled primarily grain and petroleum products. Container traffic totaled almost 10.8 million tons in 2004, a record.

Total general cargo accounted for an estimated 11.3 million tons, including 6 million tons each for dry and liquid bulk shipments.

Taddeo said he expects container traffic to grow by 4 percent in 2005, and also foresees increases in steel products and petroleum to serve neighboring Eastern Ontario province since the shutdown of a major refinery.

The rail congestion problems of last summer have been resolved and "we are fluid here," Taddeo said. Sixty percent of the containers transiting the port move by rail; Canadian Pacific hauls 85 percent and Canadian National the remaining 15 percent.

Greater port handling efficiency will have to come in large part from improvements outside the port, Taddeo said. The MPA will spend C$31 million (US$25.4 million) to improve infrastructure, including new cranes, and security. But the surrounding roadways are congested by the 1,800 trucks that enter and exit the port each day, with no solutions in sight. …

Taddeo and CP Rail are also seeking provincial and federal government support to upgrade the Detroit River Tunnel linking the U.S. and Canada to accommodate double-stack trains, as Canadian National did several years ago at Port Huron, Mich. "Everybody agrees that we have to improve fluidity into the Detroit market, by rail as well as road," Taddeo said.

Taddeo sees little immediate prospect of Montreal benefiting from a shift by trans-Pacific ocean carriers away from crowded West Coast ports. "I think people will continue to look at serving the Midwest United States through gateways they already have, for example expanding Prince Rupert, British Columbia, as an alternative to Vancouver (B.C.), Seattle and Tacoma," he said.