The recent discussions regarding long-term leasing of the Seagirt Terminal and MTA transit woes reveal the hypocrisy of Maryland’s largely Democratic leadership regarding its commitment to maintain the State business assets that have the most potential to boost Maryland’s faltering economy.

The Sun paper (“Seagirt slips to competition” August 6, 2008) reports that 18 years ago the Seagirt terminal opening was lauded as the beginning of the “renaissance” for the Port of Baltimore.  The terminal, which handles exclusively container cargo, is a potentially lucrative State and business joint venture resulting from receiving, handling and shipping goods from overseas.

Yet today, the terminal operates at less than half of its capacity, largely as a result of the failure in vision of the Democratic leadership in Maryland to update port and rail facilities to enable rail carriers to view the Port of Baltimore as a viable vehicle for transporting container cargo.  The Sun paper reports that

Seagirt is beset by structural problems the port officials are seeking to resolve….

* While double-stacking containers on trains has become the industry standard for efficiency reasons, only single-stacked cars can move out of Seagirt….

* Some 66 precious waterfront acres at Seagirt are occupied by CSX Corp.’s intermodal station, where it mostly transfers trucked-in domestic containers. Only 10 percent of containers handled there come in by ship, though the facility was built to support international trade.

The primary reason for these structural problems?  An infrastructural impediment:  the Howard Street tunnel.  According to the Sun,

[f]or more than a decade, the state and CSX have quibbled about how to divide the costs of gaining clearances for double-stacked trains. Neither side wants to pay the $1 billion it could take to increase clearance in Baltimore’s Howard Street tunnel, the chief impediment.

Now, the administration is considering

[h]iring a private contractor to run Seagirt under a long-term lease [a]s one possible avenue the state could pursue by mid-2009. The operator would assume complete control of Seagirt - the berths, cranes, containers, asphalt, everything but the land itself - and cough up millions for projects that the state feels it can’t afford.

But what about the tunnel?

“We’d say, ‘Here’s the keys: you operate it for 30 years and continue to improve the facility so you can continue to handle the ships that operate there,’ “said James J. White, the port administration’s executive director. “We have to create an environment that’s better than other ports so the ship owners want to come here.”

But what about the tunnel? Michael Dress of the Baltimore Sun (“MTA plan stalls” August 11, 2008) reports that a new tunnel at Howard Street is not slated for completion  until the fourth phase of the MTA’s long-range “improvement” plan sometime in 2035.

David Paulson, the Maryland Democratic Party Communications Director, takes the GOP to task for what he sees as support for the Ehrlich administration’s failure to maintain mass transit service and maintenance.  He lauds Martin O’Malley as “a pro-active Governor who is upgrading our state’s aging equipment-the result of neglect and indifference to transportation issues by the previous administration.”

Yet years of continuing neglect and indifference by the Democratic Party to crucial port issues– such as the Howard Street tunnel replacement– reveal the hypocrisy and the lack of strategic vision necessary to upgrade Maryland’s business resources and attract new businesses to Maryland, both essential elements in creating the business-friendly environment necessary to improve Maryland’s shrinking economy.

Maryland’s residents could use a respite from the current economic storm.  Eliminating the obstacles to port growth and expansion may provide such a safe harbor, but today it is unlikely that anyone in the O’Malley administration is onboard with a solution.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 15th, 2008 at 11:57 am and is filed under Business in Maryland. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.