Sept.8, 2021

Greetings!

We are beginning to see a reduction in the number of containers on Garden City Terminal, however, import dwell times continue to rise, up by nearly a day compared to a week ago. As of Tuesday morning, we had 74,768 containers on terminal, compared to 79,813 a week ago and 83,927 the week before that. Import dwell times are now averaging 11.81 days. We continue to stress the need for importers to evacuate containers from Garden City Terminal, stay below allocation and reduce dwell times.

With continued efforts, we expect to make progress reducing the number of containers on terminal and, in turn, the number of ships at anchor.

The no-work holiday on Labor Day Monday only slightly increased the number of vessels at anchor from 20 last week to 22 Tuesday. The average number of days vessels are waiting to be worked bumped up from 5.7 days a week ago to 5.89 days on Sept. 7.

Moving to first-come, first-serve vessel service gives ocean carriers and cargo owners greater predictability for arrival times and receiving windows.

Additionally, we would like to encourage ocean carriers to begin basing their export receiving windows on expected vessel work dates, instead of when a vessel arrives in Savannah waters. This receiving window shift will allow terminal space to remain open for as long as possible. This will help all vessels work more efficiently.

The Saturday gate hours that we expanded from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., with no interruption at lunch hour, experienced an 11 percent drop in volume this past weekend, due to the holiday. However, we ask that you consider spreading out your volumes across six days rather than five, and converting cargo, when possible, from truck to rail. As mentioned before, our rail dwell times are less than two days, and our Mason Mega Rail and Appalachian Regional Port are currently under-utilized.

Truck turn times last week were down to 37 minutes for single moves and 58 minutes for double moves reductions of two and five minutes, respectively. However, 40-foot chassis street dwell time increased slightly from 15.5 days a week ago to 15.6 days currently.

I want to thank all of our supply chain partners for your cooperation and dedication, from BCOs and ocean carriers, to trucking, rail and distribution centers. This unprecedented spike in cargo volume requires new approaches to ensure world-class service.

Sincerely,
Griff Lynch
Executive Director
Georgia Ports Authority
Find current vessels at berth and at anchor here.