The Port of Beaumont is a deep-water

port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...

located in

Beaumont Beaumont may refer to: Places Canada * Beaumont, Alberta * Beaumont, Quebec England * Beaumont, Cumbria * Beaumont, Essex ** Beaumont Cut, a canal closed in the 1930s * Beaumont Street, Oxford France (communes) * Beaumont, Ardèche * ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

near the mouth of the

Neches River The Neches River () begins in Van Zandt County west of Rhine Lake and flows for through the piney woods of east Texas, defining the boundaries of 14 counties on its way to its mouth on Sabine Lake near the Rainbow Bridge. Two major reservoirs, ...

. It is the fourth busiest port in the United States according to the

American Association of Port Authorities The American Association of Port Authorities (AAPA) is a trade association founded in 1912 that represents 150 port authorities in the Western Hemisphere, including the United States, Canada, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Headquartered in W ...

''U.S. Port Ranking by Cargo Tonnage, 2018'' report, and the forty-seventh busiest in the world in terms of tonnage, according to the American Association of Port Authorities ''World Port Rankings 2013'' report. It is also the busiest military port in the world for processing U.S. military equipment. The port serves as headquarters to the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, ...

's 842d Transportation Battalion, which specializes in port logistical activity.

Location

The port is located approximately 84 miles east of

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...

and 270 miles west of

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

. It is about 42 miles inland from the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United ...

along the Sabine-Neches Waterway. The Sabine-Neches Waterway has a minimum depth of 40 feet and a minimum width of 400 feet. The

Gulf Intracoastal Waterway The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway is the portion of the Intracoastal Waterway located along the Gulf Coast of the United States. It is a navigable inland waterway running approximately from Carrabelle, Florida, to Brownsville, Texas. The waterwa ...

is approximately 15 miles south of the port.

Port features

''Source:''
The port includes a

Roll-on/roll-off Roll-on/roll-off (RORO or ro-ro) ships are cargo ships designed to carry wheeled cargo, such as cars, motorcycles, trucks, semi-trailer trucks, buses, trailers, and railroad cars, that are driven on and off the ship on their own wheels or using ...

dock; 94 acres of open storage; 574,710 sq ft of covered storage; rail storage; a 1,100 ft diameter turning basin; and a 3.5 million bushel capacity grain elevator. The port has the largest harbor mobile crane in the Gulf of Mexico region, a 140 metric ton capacity crane with a 168-foot extension. The port also has three marine terminals. The Carroll Street wharf has 108,900 sq ft of covered storage and 1,435 ft of harbor front. The Harbor Island Marine terminal has 345,000 sq ft of covered and open storage with 1,880 feet of harbor frontage. The Jefferson Energy Terminal, located on 250 acres of land, has one barge dock and one ship dock. 1st Air Cavalry Brigade Takes Birds to Port DVIDS159738

1st Air Cavalry Brigade Takes Birds to Port DVIDS159738

Access

''Source:''
The port has highway and rail access in addition to the Sabine-Neches Waterway gulf and ocean access, and close proximity to the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway.

Interstate 10 Interstate 10 (I-10) is the southernmost cross-country highway in the American Interstate Highway System. I-10 is the fourth-longest Interstate in the United States at , following I-90, I-80, and I-40. This freeway is part of the originally p ...

, US Highway 90, US Highway 69, US Highway 96, and US Highway 287 provide highway access. Three major railways, the

Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway BNSF Railway is one of the largest freight railroads in North America. One of seven North American Class I railroads, BNSF has 35,000 employees, of track in 28 states, and nearly 8,000 locomotives. It has three transcontinental routes that ...

, the

Kansas City Southern Railway The Kansas City Southern Railway Company is an American Class I railroad. Founded in 1887, it operates in 10 midwestern and southeastern U.S. states: Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Loui ...

, and the

Union Pacific Railway The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Paci ...

provide rail connections to the port.

History

The port's origins date to 1908, when crews dug a 9-foot-deep canal in the

from

Beaumont, Texas Beaumont is a coastal city in the U.S. state of Texas. It is the seat of government of Jefferson County, within the Beaumont– Port Arthur metropolitan statistical area, located in Southeast Texas on the Neches River about east of Houston ( ...

to the existing Port Arthur ship channel. The port's channel was later deepened to 25 feet and a

turning basin A turning basin, winding basin or swinging basin is a wider body of water, either located at the end of a ship canal or in a port to allow cargo ships to turn and reverse their direction of travel, or to enable long narrow barges in a canal to tu ...

was added. By the 1940s, the channel's depth was increased to 40 feet. Plans to deepen the Sabine-Neches Waterway to 48 feet received federal approval in 2014. The $1.1 billion deepening project is expected to start in 2017 and is estimated to take between 12 and 15 years to complete. Once a division of the city of Beaumont, the port was established in 1949 by the 51st Texas Legislature as a navigation district, or separate taxing entity.

Cargo

''Source:''
Principal cargoes serviced by the port include: *Imports: Forest products (eucalyptus pulp), aggregate, military cargo, project cargo, wind turbine components, iron and steel and other metal articles. *Exports: Bulk grain, military cargo, iron and steel, vehicles, crude oil, diesel, gasoline and bagged goods.

References

External links

Port of Beaumont website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Port Of Beaumont

Beaumont–Port Arthur metropolitan area Economy of Beaumont, Texas Transportation in Jefferson County, Texas