Hampton Roads terminals report record-breaking cargo volume during past 12 months

Despite global supply chain bottlenecks and woes at other U.S. ports, Hampton Roads’ port had a record-breaking fiscal year, Virginia Port Authority leaders announced Tuesday.

Area terminals moved the equivalent capacity of almost 3.7 million 20-foot-long containers during the 2022 fiscal year, which ran from July 1, 2021, to June 30. The figure is an all-time high for the port and an almost 15% increase from the previous fiscal year.

The record is the result of years of infrastructure improvements that helped the terminals handle cargo diverted from problems at West Coast ports, port authority spokesperson Joe Harris said.

“The investment that we made of those couple years previous is really paying off,” Harris said.

Several high cargo-volume months and high efficiency operations led to the record-setting year, according to the release. For example, the port processed the equivalent of 340,000 20-foot-long containers in May, setting a record for monthly productivity.

“Our labor partners and the entire port team performed at a very high level and the result is a record-setting fiscal year,” Stephen Edwards, Virginia Port Authority CEO and executive director, said in the announcement.

When congestion and long delays from pandemic-related supply chain issues hit the Los Angeles and Long Beach, California, ports in October, the Port of Virginia was able to avoid a similar fate, Edwards told the Pilot in November. Years of modernization efforts helped, like a $320 million expansion of the Virginia International Gateway in 2019.

The Port of Virginia also is eating into the market share of its East Coast competitors. From July to May, the port loaded more than the equivalent of 2.4 million 20-foot-long containers, a 14.5% increase from the 2021 fiscal year and a 25.4% increase from 2020. Only the Port of New York and New Jersey was able to match that year-over-year increase. Hampton Roads performed better at increasing its cargo volume than Savannah, Charleston, Baltimore and others.

Trevor Metcalfe, 757-222-5345, trevor.metcalfe@pilotonline.com