Thursday, October 15, 2009

Vancouver USA Port Approves 2010 Budget

The governing board of the Washington state Port of Vancouver on Tuesday approved a $56.2 million budget for 2010, shaving about $3 million of the previous years budget of $59.6 million.

Port officials cited the need to be conservative with the budget despite predictions of a global economic turnaround as early as next year by some experts. The Vancouver port, which deals almost exclusively with bulk and break-bulk commodities such as minerals, grains and automobiles, has been hit particularly hard by the global cargo slump.

While the 2010 budget is a sharp decline from the port's peak budget of $127.4 million in 2008, port officials said this merely reflected a drawing down of capital projects over the past several years.

The new budget still allocated about $23 million to continue work on the Terminal 5 rail loop, part of the $137 million West Vancouver Freight Access project designed to relieve freight train congestion through the port and the city.