U.S. East, Gulf Coast Ports Restart Cargo Operations After Dockworkers Suspend Strike

Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Ports along the U.S. Gulf and East coasts are restarting cargo operations, as the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) and the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX) ended a three-day dockworkers strike by reaching a tentative agreement on wages and agreeing to extend the parties' master contract until January 15, 2025. The strike came to an end late Thursday when the ILA and USMX agreed to a wage increase plan and as a result, according to a joint statement, "effective immediately, all current job actions will cease and all work covered by the master contract will resume."

According to news media reporting, the new deal provides a pay raise of 61%, or $4 per hour over each of the six years of the pact, although a final agreement would still have to be ratified by union members.

The contract between the two parties covered about 45,000 workers, and the strike affected cargo operations at ports stretching from Maine to Texas.

Industrial Info is tracking $3.6 billion worth of projects under construction at cargo ports in the U.S., including those that were forced to halt cargo operations during the strike.

The investment includes projects aimed at increasing handling capacity at two of Port Houston's container terminals that were forced to halt operations. A $76.7 million rehabilitation of wharves 4 and 5 at the Barbours Cut Terminal entails reconstructing about 1,333 linear feet of the existing wharves and performing other infrastructure improvements, and a $20 million expansion at the Bayport Terminal entails constructing a new 1,000-foot wharf and its associated infrastructure. McCarthy Building Companies Incorporated (Saint Louis, Missouri) is providing general contracting services for the projects, which are expected to wrap up in mid- and late-2026, respectively.

Subscribers to Industrial Info's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) Project Database can read detailed reports on the Barbours Cut and Bayport terminal projects.

Terminals at the Port of Philadelphia, including the Tioga Marine Terminal, also restarted operations following the end of the strike. Industrial is tracking a warehouse expansion at the terminal, which involves constructing a 100,000-square-foot warehouse building that will enable Tioga to have more than 800,000 square feet of on-dock warehousing space. Click here to read the project report.

Another cargo port project underway is aimed at expanding the Port of Virginia's Norfolk International Terminals (NIT). The deepening and widening project at the terminal, which is expected to fully wrap up in the fall of 2025, will deepen the inner harbor shipping channel from 50 feet to 55 feet and enable large vessel ships to move in two directions in and out of the port. Click here to read the project report.

Along the Gulf Coast, the Alabama State Ports Authority is performing a roughly $300 million expansion of the Mobile Ship Channel, which began in 2020 and is expected to be completed in 2025. The project aims to expand the channel to accommodate larger cargo ships increasingly becoming the norm in seaborne shipping; it entails deepening portions of the channel from 45 feet deep to 50 or more feet in depth, as well as widening the bay channel from 400 feet to 500 feet, among other work. Subscribers can learn more by viewing the project report.

Subscribers to Industrial Info's GMI Database can click here for a full list of detailed reports for projects mentioned in this article, and click here for a full list of related plant profiles.

Click here for a full list of reports for U.S. cargo port projects that are under construction.

Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the leading provider of industrial market intelligence. Since 1983, IIR has provided comprehensive research, news and analysis on the industrial process, manufacturing and energy related industries. IIR's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) helps companies identify and pursue trends across multiple markets with access to real, qualified and validated plant and project opportunities. Across the world, IIR is tracking over 200,000 current and future projects worth $17.8 Trillion (USD).