The opening of the port of Prince Rupert is a milestone event. It is not every day that a major new port begins operations in Canada or anywhere else in North America for that matter. The port is significant for several reasons.

It offers the shortest route between Asia and a west coast port, saving 58 hours of sailing. It has North America’s deepest harbour and is accessible to double stack on-dock rail. It provides a viable option from the congestion in Vancouver and other west coast ports. The launch of the port is the result of a team effort among its key stakeholders. The $170 million terminal project with a design capacity of 500,000 TEU’s (20 foot equivalent units) has been funded by five partners:

Maher Terminals, $60 million, including three super post-panamax cranes
Government of Canada, Western Economic Diversification Canada, $30 million
Province of British Columbia, $30 million
CN Rail, $25 million towards the terminal’s rail related infrastructure and
Prince Rupert Port Authority, $25 million

In addition, under the Asia Pacific Gateway and Corridor Initiative, the Canada Border Services Agency will invest $28 million to establish a state-of-the-art container-screening program at the facility.

The beauty of the Prince Rupert operation is that there appears to be a well conceived business plan to support the launch. CN Rail is providing a 105 hour train service to Chicago. There the train can link into CN’s rail network that extends to Detroit and Memphis and all the way down to New Orleans. To improve service, CN has offered to purchase the Elgin, Joliet and Eastern Railway from United States Steel for $300 million U.S. EJ & E starts north of Chicago and circles west of the city and back to the southeast. CN plans to spend $100 million on new connections and infrastructure upgrades to the boost the capacity of this railway. CN plans to establish daily service from Prince Rupert as the volume grows. Siding lengths along its corridor from Prince Rupert to Chicago enable it to handle trains carrying the equivalent of 730 TEU’s.

The port has been added to the south loop of the Pacific North West (PNW) Butterfly service jointly operated by Cosco Container Lines and Hanjin Shipping. Hanjin is operating five vessels within the service while Cosco has four. The nine ships can each load 5500 TEU’s.

The port of Prince Rupert is off and running and with such a solid plan, it should be a great success.