The Charleston Post & Courier reports this afternoon that the South Carolina State Ports Authority is examining the feasibility of shipping containers across the harbor from the Wando Welch Marine Terminal, on one side of the harbor, to the intermodal rail facilities, serving CSX and Norfolk Southern railroads, on the other.  These railyards will be an integral part of the new container terminal under construction at the former Navy base in North Charleston. 

“We’d like to consider the idea of an inter-harbor container barge,” SPA President and CEO Jim Newsome told members of North Charleston City Council Tuesday night. “We have to look at creative ways of moving containers within the harbor, and to this ICTF (intermodal container transfer facility).”

It seems that if barges can compete with trucks that move all containers from the Wando Terminal to the railyards today, this inter-harbor service could potentially remove thousands of trucks from I-526 and the Don Holt Bridge every week.