Posted on February 14, 2025
By Ric Anderson| In the annual State of the Port event, board chair Wendy Hamilton says this could be a “transformational year.”
Terminal upgrades that are scheduled to go online in coming months and increased connectivity between Jacksonville and seaports around the world have JaxPort leaders feeling bullish about 2025, the chair of the Port Authority board said Feb. 5.
During the annual State of the Port event, board Chair Wendy Hamilton and CEO Eric Green said the port was positioned for a prosperous year thanks to infrastructure investments, a diversified business strategy and its relationships within new global carrier alliances.
“Looking ahead, 2025 is shaping up to be a transformational year for JaxPort,” Hamilton said, commending Green for putting the port on a path to continued growth and development.
According to the port, projects expected to come on line this year include:
• A $72 million modernization of the SSA Marine Jacksonville Container Terminal. The upgrades, which are expected to be completed in spring 2025, include 97 acres of new asphalt that allow the terminal to accommodate about 650,000 20-foot equivalent units, or TEUs, annually. The addition will bring JaxPort’s total TEU capacity to nearly 2.5 million annually, approximately double the amount that goes through the port today. TEU refers to the size of a standard shipping container that is about 20 feet long, 8 feet wide and 8 feet tall.
• Three new cranes are expected arrive this year, part of a $70 million investment to maintain and upgrade the port’s set of container cranes.
• Southeast Toyota Distributors is projecting a summer 2025 completion of its 340,000-square-foot auto processing facility at Blount Island. Funded with $120 million in private investment, the new facility will increase Southeast’s capacity and will support more than 800 jobs, according to the port.
In January, JaxPort completed expansion of a Blount Island vehicle berth, allowing the port to accommodate larger ships more efficiently.
Among other longer-term projects, JaxPort is working with JEA to raise overhead power lines near Blount Island to provide 205 feet of clearance for ships. The project is expected to be completed by the end of 2026.
Also, port officials say a $54 million new vehicle berth at Blount Island will be completed in 2027.
Once Southeast Toyota relocates to its new facility, terminal operator Enstructure plans to expand its Talleyrand terminal with the addition of a 250,000-square-foot warehouse that will increase the port’s capacity to handle non-containerized cargo such as forest products by 20%.
The port’s cruise business will expand in the fall of 2025 with service by Norwegian Cruise Line’s Norwegian Gem.
In 2024, the port set a record for cruise traffic as 206,000 Carnival passengers set sail from Jacksonville.
February 2025 marked the start of new and enhanced partnerships with leading ocean carriers. They were:
• The Gemini Cooperation, an alliance between Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, which added JaxPort to a new, direct service calling on Cartagena, Colombia. This connects Jacksonville to South American markets along with the global Gemini network, which includes ports in Asia, Central America, Oceania, the Caribbean and Europe.
• JaxPort remains partnered with the Mediterranean Shipping Company and Zim Line, providing service between Asia and JaxPort. Those companies’ enhanced Emerald/E-Commerce Express service will create new connections for JaxPort in Southeast Asia, China, Vietnam, plus Cartagena, Colombia and Singapore.
• Through an agreement with the Premier Alliance, JaxPort retained connections to Singapore, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Thailand and Canada. Ocean Network Express, a partner in the alliance, announced that JaxPort would be part of its EC2 service calling ports in Northeast Asia, South Korea and Panama. In 2024, JaxPort became part of ONE’s West India North America service, with connections in India and Pakistan.
The State of the Port also spotlighted JaxPort’s diversification effort, which included expanding its connections and capacity to handle different cargo types to insulate the port from shipping disruptions in any particular region or volatility in import and export markets.
JaxPort reported that cargo activity through the port supported more than 228,100 jobs in Florida and $44 billion in annual economic output for the region and state in 2024.
The Propeller Club of the United States – Port of Jacksonville hosted the State of the Port event.
It was held at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront. About 600 members of the transportation and logistics industry attended along with governmental, business and community leaders.
