17 April 2024 (Lloyd's List) - THE Port of Portland will cease container operations on October 1 after years of significant financial difficulty.

The US west coast port said last month it had seen losses of more than $30m from container operations during the past three years despite an uptick in volume, with losses of $14m alone expected for the current fiscal year.

The port had asked for state support for the container terminal to the tune of $8m and sought a new third-party lease.

Philippines-based International Container Terminal Services took control of the city’s Terminal 6 container port in 2011, but left the port in 2017, leaving the terminal without a leaseholder and in the hands of the State of Oregon.

Labour disputes with the International Longshore and Warehouse Union led to tumbling teu volumes from 2015, reaching zero in 2017, and resulted in ILWU being ordered to pay a settlement of $20.5m to ICTSI.

Volumes did pick up during the pandemic as Portland offered an alternative to congested west coast ports, reaching a peak of 171,481 teu in 2022. South Korea-based SM Line started a weekly service to the port in 2020 and Mediterranean Shipping Company still calls at Portland as part of its Chinook service.

Yet port officials say without a third-party operator the terminal is simply not financially viable. Local media reported Port of Portland chief trade and economic development officer Keith Leavitt as saying they had run out of road.

“We know that this terminal is a critical statewide asset — it is worthy of further discussions to come up with a financially sustainable business model for container service that has significantly more state funding and investment,” he told industry stakeholders in an email.

“For now, we have run out of financial options and must take this step.”