Comparing Charleston and Savannah

Have you noticed how much the press, politicians, and the State Ports Authority want to compete with the port in Savannah?

Did you know that Savannah has about the same port infrastructure as Charleston but is handling 50% more containers?

Let's look at the facts .

The Port of Savannah has 9,693 feet of berth space for container ships and 495 acres for container storage .The Port of Charleston, according to the SPA website, has 9,800 feet of berth space at our 3 container terminals and 450 acres of container storage.

Regarding the ability to handle the largest container ships, the Port of Charleston has a clear advantage. Taxpayers spent over $130 million dollars to dredge Charleston to a minimum depth of 47 feet at mean low water (MLW) a few years back. The Port of Charleston website states ,"All terminals are within two hours of the open sea, our channels are deep and wide enough to handle 8,000 teu ships today, and our air draft specs are exceptional. The Port of Charleston is big-ship-ready now."

Savannah is not "big ship ready now". Savannah only has a 42 foot draft and is located many miles up a winding river.

Yet , last year Savannah handled 2.6 million TEU's versus Charleston's 1.75 million TEU's. Savannah handled 50% more volume than Charleston. Yet, we are told by our port leaders Charleston can not keep up with Savannah unless we build one more very expensive terminal. The reason we are told our container volume is slipping is because we are out of capacity- we must expand or we will wither and die.

But then again, on the SPA's website, dated March 22, 2008, it states, "The capacity of our current facilities operated in the current style is approximately 2.6 million TEU per year. "

It would appear our port operations have at least 50% more capacity - without expanding . And that is before we build a much bigger terminal in Jasper
County- hopefully at little or no cost to the taxpayers .

One common sense reason why Savannah should handle more container volume is simply it's state population. In 2006, the U.S. census estimated Georgia's population to be 9.4 million versus South Carolina's population of
4.3 million.

It is not a mystery why the Port of New York- New Jersey handles the most container volume on the East Coast - it has the largest population base . The largest port complex on the West Coast- Los Angeles / Long Beach also has the largest population base to service.

It would be terribly expensive and misguided for South Carolina taxpayers to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to compete in a race with Georgia to see which state handles the most containers.

Georgia has the population base to support a professional baseball, basketball, and football team. South Carolina does not and would be foolish to try. Georgia has the population to support the big box distribution centers -like Home Depot.

We have enough state owned and operated port capacity today to compete with Savannah. Let's create more capacity in Jasper County without spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars.

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More Information:
Charleston Port Related Air Quality Issues

Charleston Port Economics

Comparing Charleston and Savannah

East Coast Port Competition

Problems and Solutions