Eight new shuttle trucks are being prepared for service at Virginia International Gateway (VIG) to support the terminal’s capacity expansion project. The shuttle trucks are mobile container handlers that quickly move export and import containers from the piers to the container stacks using fuel-efficient diesel-electric power. They will be used to support expanded vessel and container operations at VIG that will come as a result of the berth and container yard expansions.

“The timing of the equipment arrivals is critical to maintaining our schedule and progress and these arrivals are timed perfectly,” said John F. Reinhart, CEO and executive director of the Virginia Port Authority. “We will be putting the first of our new container stacks into service and as the construction on the first stacks wraps up, we will be able to immediately begin the installation of the cargo conveyance hardware and transition to the next stack to repeat the process.”

Since February, eight new low-emission, diesel-electric shuttle trucks, four new cantilever rail-mounted gantry cranes, and six new rail-mounted gantry cranes (RMGs) have been delivered. The terminal will receive eight more new shuttle trucks by the end of March and 20 additional RMGs by summer’s end. Four new large ship-to-shore cargo cranes are set to arrive in early 2019.

At VIG, the process of bringing new stacks on line will continue through August; the expansion will be complete by spring 2019.

“We are making significant progress on the capacity expansion project at VIG, and across the river at NIT,” Reinhart said. “When both projects are complete in 2020, we will have increased the container capacity at The Port of Virginia by 40 percent, or 1 million container units. The end result of our effort will be new revenue streams, economic investment in Virginia, jobs for Virginians and sustainability for The Port of Virginia for decades to come.”

In February 2017, construction on the $320 million VIG expansion got underway. The work includes adding 13 new container stacks to the container stack yard – supported by 26 new RMGs – lengthening the berth, four new ship-to-shore container cranes, doubling the size of the rail operation and adding new lanes to the truck gate.

The first new container stack was brought online at VIG on April 23. Construction of the additional lanes at the truck gate is underway. Pile-driving for the 850-foot-long berth extension is complete and crews are beginning the preparatory work for pouring concrete. Work is scheduled for completion in October.

Components of the two cantilever rail-mounted gantry cranes (CRMGs) were delivered in February and assembly of those units is underway. The CRMGs will be used to support the expanded rail operation. The first phase of construction on the expansion of the rail operation is underway and that phase will be ready for operation in June.