Late in 2008, global shipping leader APL will mark the 160th anniversary of its founding. And this summer its year-long birthday celebration continued on San Francisco Bay.
By Paul Duclos
Published: September, 2008
APL was a sponsor of the Festival of Sail, a five-day tribute to the age of sailing ships organized by the San Francisco Maritime National Park Association at the end of July. Hundreds of thousands of visitors jammed the city waterfront to inspect a dozen majestic tall ships including the U.S. Coast Cutter Eagle and a replica of Captain Bligh’s HMS Bounty.
On the first day of the festival, spectators were treated to a tall ships parade that passed under the Golden Gate Bridge. Anchoring the 12-vessel string was the tallest ship of all: the APL Singapore, an 863-foot-long containership that regularly calls the San Francisco Bay Area at the Port of Oakland.
The Festival of Sail is the biggest San Francisco Bay Area maritime event in recent memory, said Bob Sappio, senior vice president of the Trans-Pacific Trade at APL and a member of the Board of Trustees of the San Francisco Maritime National Association. The timing was perfect, and we were pleased to take a leadership role.
APL’s predecessor, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, was founded in 1848 in New York State. October 4th marks the 160th anniversary of the sailing of its first ship—a three-masted side-wheel steamer—from the U.S. East Coast to California.
So far in 2008, the international container carrier has marked the milestone year with customer celebrations in Asia and the U.S. The Festival of Sail was the biggest bash yet.
Visitors streamed through APL’s exhibit on the San Francisco waterfront, a shiny blue 20-foot container decked out with enlarged pictures of the company’s ships since APL’s founding. The display included a video about APL’s history and emphasized the development of the maritime industry and its importance to the world economy.
Pier 80 Gets New Management Company
The Port of San Francisco has concluded a new five-year terminal management agreement with Metro Ports to operate the Pier 80 Omni-cargo Terminal. Metro currently handles the stevedoring for the Hanson Aggregates Mid Pacific, Inc. bulk facility at Pier 94, and Metro’s affiliate Metro Cruise Services LLC operates the Port’s Pier 35 cruise terminal. In the 1980s, California Stevedore & Ballast (CS&B), the original parent corporation to Metro, managed the Pier 80 terminal, the cruise terminal, and other businesses in the San Francisco bay region.
With this new agreement, Metro will bring back its breakbulk cargo handling expertise from other California and southeastern ports operations to Pier 80, while emphasizing customer service for the current major clients that include Star Shipping, Saga Forest Carriers, Oldendorff Carriers, and Gearbulk.
In 2007, Pier 80 accommodated 160,000 metric tons of breakbulk cargo.Major commodities included various steel products such as coils, rebar, plate, beams and pipe; boats and yachts; lumber; newsprint; and project cargoes. The facility also accommodates bagged, crated and roll-on/roll-off cargoes.
In 2004, the terminal was selected by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to be the first terminal on the U.S. West Coast to install Radiation Portal Monitors (RPM) to screen all import cargo. The port looks forward to this agreement with Metro reinvigorating its cargo marketing efforts and increasing its cargo volumes at the 70-acre facility that has four deep-water berths (38-40 feet MLLW), four shore side gantry cranes with 40-long ton capacity, on-dock rail, 400,000 square feet of covered storage, ample paved land for staging project cargoes, 2700 lineal feet of dock with a dock load of 1000 lbs./sq. ft., and quick access to two major highways.
The Port of San Francisco is extremely pleased to have Metro Ports managing our Pier 80 terminal operation, said Peter Dailey, Port of San Francisco deputy director of maritime. With Metro on board, we believe that we have all the pieces in place to provide a solid product to our customers and grow our cargo business.
Port of San Francisco Executive Director Monique Moyer was equally bullish on the cargo angle:
The agreement with Metro Ports is another important step in the Port’s strategic plan to enhance our maritime business, said Moyer In addition to the Illinois Street Bridge and our agreement with San Francisco Bay Railroad, the Port has entered into agreements to enlarge our drydock for ship repair and install shoreside power for cruise vessels.
