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COURTESY OF ENSTRUCTURE
WITH INVESTM ENT, UPGRADES AN D EXPANSION PLANS,
Port of Wilmington Has a Bright Future
By Tina Irgang Leaderman
deep-water port and marine
Port Wilmington is a full-service,
terminal located where the
Delaware and Christina rivers
meet. It features 10 berths, including those
that are designed for container vessels,
breakbulk and bulk vessels, roll-on/roll-
off vessels and liquid tankers. The port
also provides direct access to dedicated
interstate ramps and direct access to Class
I railroad service.
One major competitive advantage for
the port is its location, said Jeffrey W.
Bullock, Delaware’s Secretary of State.
Bullock also chairs the Diamond State Port
Corporation, which owns the Port of Wilm-
ington. “Delaware is within a day’s drive
of hundreds of millions of people. There
is a huge market literally at our doorstep.”
That market is easy to access: the port
is less than a quarter mile from I-495 and
a very short distance also from I-95, I-295,
the New Jersey Turnpike and the Pennsyl-
vania Turnpike.
“The port is located in an uncongested
area while still being strategically posi-
tioned at the intersection of major inter-
states,” said Bayard Hogans, president of
the Mid-Atlantic division at Enstructure,
the private company that operates the
port under a public-private partnership
agreement with the Diamond State Port
Corporation. “It is an ideal inland location
with logistically advantaged access to key
distribution hubs and densely populated
regions along the East Coast, while also
offering close proximity to the ocean for
efficient maritime operations.”
Companies shipping through Wilming-
ton can expect quick turnaround times
as well.
“We have one of the best workforces
of any port on the East Coast — they are
efficient, great to work with, productive,”
Bullock said. “The longer a ship sits idle,
the more money is being wasted from a
shipper’s point of view, and our workforce
is very good at minimizing idle time. This
is especially important because we have
a lot of perishable cargo.”
Another advantage: Wilmington is less
congested than some of the larger East Coast
ports, Bullock said. As a result, “the cargo
is off the ship and on the road in minutes.”
While much of the port’s current
business comes from perishables such
as bananas and other fruit, the port’s
workforce is also experienced in handling
containers, breakbulk (cargo that is trans-
ported in units rather than containers),
liquid bulk and roll-on/roll-off cargo (cargo
such as vehicles and machinery that moves
on wheels onto and off a ship).
The port has also handled a wide
spectrum of oversized cargos, including
Antares rocket boosters for NASA and wind
energy components.
New Cargo Terminal to Allow for
More Containers, Bigger Ships
For businesses looking to ship through
Wilmington, there is further good news
on the horizon: a new container terminal
is in the works that will allow the port to
accept a greater volume of business as well
as larger ships.
“Delaware is within a day’s drive of
hundreds of millions of people.
There is a huge market literally
at our doorstep.”
– Jeffrey W. Bullock, Secretary of State, Delaware
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