Baltimore bridge collapse will redirect cargo across the US
Port of Baltimore and closed a major highway will cause weeks or months of transportation disruptions in the Mid-Atlantic region and accelerate a shift of cargo to the US West Coast as importers and exporters try to avoid potential bottlenecks at trade gateways from Boston to Miami.
“Companies have already begun shifting volumes from the East Coast to the West Coast,” said Ryan Petersen, the founder and chief executive of Flexport Inc., a digital freight platform based in San Francisco. “Baltimore being taken offline means all the other ports on the East Coast are getting this bubble of cargo — creating congestion and delays.”
That also means companies and consumers may face a repeat of one of the big supply chain lessons of the Covid pandemic: that a sudden 10% or 20% increase in volumes through a port “is enough to cause massive backlogs, congestion, ships waiting offshore and all sorts of delays that can compound on themselves,” Petersen said.
As local, state and federal officials focus on rescue efforts and wouldn’t speculate on how long the nation’s busiest automobile port might stay closed, logistics experts and economists started to assess the fallout. The emerging consensus: It’s going to be a logistical choke-point for a while, but a localized one that shouldn’t derail an otherwise solid US economy, with companies able to adapt.
European carmakers including BMW AG, Volkswagen AG and Mercedes-Benz Group AG have facilities in and around the port to handle vehicle shipments. Ford Motor Co. said it’s already
