Four of the industry’s newest generation gantry cranes designed for today’s largest container ships arrived at APM Terminals Elizabeth on April 26, 2018. The arrival marks a major milestone in a $200 million facility infrastructure investment by APM Terminals that will be completed this year. This complements the $7 billion capital investments already made by the Port Authority to ready the Port of New York and New Jersey for the world’s largest ships. Large-scale investments included the Bayonne Bridge elevation and the Harbor Deepening Program, both of which now enable the Port to handle larger container ships up to 18,000 TEUs and remain the largest Port on the East Coast.
The new Ultra Super Post-Panamax Cranes reach 23 containers across the vessel beam – equivalent to two thirds the width of a football field – and increases productivity for terminal customers who enter the Port with larger ships containing increased cargo volumes. The arrival of the cranes coincided with the completion of the deepening of the Port channels to 50 feet.
These are the largest pre-assembled cranes to pass beneath the Bayonne Bridge since being raised to 215 feet above the Kill Van Kull in 2017.