Port of Redwood City’s Zortman “cautiously optimistic” about 2025

Despite the turmoil surrounding trade, tariffs and shipping, the Port of Redwood City’s executive director Kristine Zortman is “cautiously optimistic” about Port business prospects in 2025.

Improved Dredging

In an interview with AJOT, Zortman said the Port has succeeded in winning federal appropriations for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide annual dredging of the Port’s ship channel, a major victory.

The second major victory has been to ensure that the ship channel dredging was completed to a depth of 30 feet so that ships can load and unload to their maximum capacity at Port terminals without resorting to offloading construction materials onto barges due to dredging shortfalls.

The result, Zortman reports: “You will also note that the cumulative number of barges have gone down (21 in FY23 and 8 in FY24), which is a great indicator that our channel is holding its depth for full vessel delivery……always celebrate the small but meaningful channel depth victories!”

This has been welcome news for port tenants such as Sims Metal, which receives, sorts, separates, and stores bulk metal scrap for export at the Port and for CEMEX, the cement, concrete, and aggregate maker which operates an 8.2-acre terminal at the Port.

In previous years, shipments that had to come in on barge raised freight transportation costs and slowed deliveries.

As of December 31, 2024, the Port had processed 677,165 tons of cargo including the import of aggregate and sand and the export of scrap metal.

At a tour of the ort on April 9^th, Vinny Way, Area Operations Manager | Northern Products Group for Graniterock described the importance of the Port in transporting construction material to the San Francisco Bay. Graniterock receives cement from Cemex (via water) which is Port tenant.

Positive Revenue Forecast

Zortman expects that the Port will close out FY 2025 with an increase in revenues thanks in part to the diversification of its revenue stream: “On the revenue side… we have seen good increases consistently ... So that keeps us whole. The revenue is coming definitely from all of our cargo operations, but then it is coming also from our real estate that is non maritime. So, … we have got our commercial real estate down by the marina. That is non maritime. And then we've got our liquid bulk recycling entities (which) are non-maritime. So, we have got quite a few non maritime entities that we are able to get better… So, when we close out our books in June, our projection is that we will be in good shape … We are cautiously optimistic … “

Tonnage Decline

Zortman said that as of “…our mid-year at December 31^st (2024) we saw … a decrease in our tonnage by about 16%.”

The reason for this is: “We're attributing that to a couple of things ... People were hesitating before and after the election. And… all of last year we saw, based upon the information we are getting from all of our port partners, we saw a decline in office building. People are trying to get out of their offices. People are not going back to work. Google has eight of the 12 buildings over here. It is my understanding they are trying to sell all eight of the ones they've … acquired in 2018. That is up to 1.2 million square feet. So, we attribute kind of the decline that we have seen based upon what we are… hearing from all our partners is just a decline in the construction industry, primarily the office sector. “

However, in 2025, there has been an increase in tonnage: “We are starting to now see tonnage trickling back up again in January, February. So, we are hopeful that we will be closing out the year positive. “

New Ferry Terminal

The Redwood City Ferry Terminal Project marks the next step in implementing the public ferry service and aligns with the proposed project schedule to be completed in 2026. The purpose of this project is to create an alternative transportation option for commuters and help remove traffic congestion from the highways. The Port will represent the southernmost hub and connect the mid-Peninsula to the San Francisco Bay Ferry System, serving San Francisco and East Bay.

Plans are moving ahead for a new ferry terminal at the Port that will bring in new foot traffic and create opportunities to restaurants and retail business: “We are still going through drafting the EIR (Environmental Impact Report) with an anticipated publication at … the fourth quarter of this calendar year or first quarter of the calendar year, 2026… It has been a little delayed, but that is to be anticipated with an EIR.”

She said the ferry terminal area will compose nine acres and will have “a roof and a floating dock … And then we are doing a programmatic level to be able to build out other uses, whether it is hotel or ancillary restaurants and other types of things that complement the ferry terminal.”

Federal Emergency Staging Area and Port Security

The Port of Redwood City is designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) as a Federal Staging Area (FSA) for the South San Francisco Bay region. The FSA designation provides in the case of an emergency, the Port of Redwood City is situated perfectly to keep the movement of goods, people and emergency resources flowing in the South Bay Area.

The Port of Redwood City receives annual security grants from the Port Security Grant Program, from the Department of Homeland Security which is designed to protect critical port infrastructure from threats that could impact public safety, supply chain disruption, cyber threats, or other security challenges.

Zortman said the grant is not a certainty in 2025: “We met with one of the FEMA directors when we were in DC a few weeks ago. What we are concerned about is we have successfully been getting money through the Port Security Grant Program, which further strengthens that designation. And if that … disappears, then really and truly that capital investment continues to fall back on the Port … we range around anywhere from … 800,000 to a little over a million every year.”

The grants went for cybersecurity training last year: ‘It also pays for some of the exercises we do … we have got fire boats from it; we have got police boats from it. We have got a new police vehicle that is getting delivered. We have got some new floating dock infrastructure that we will be building that came through the Port Security Grant Program. We have got a whole new camera system we are putting in right now. So, a lot of … enhancements to cybersecurity and other things.”

Barging Dredge Materials To Beneficial Reuse Sites

With annual dredging of the ship channel on a more secure footing, the Port now has dredge materials that can be used for beneficial use applications including wetlands restoration that help control flooding: “And so we are working on a new project that would be domestic in nature, and it would be barging soils and materials to beneficial reuse sites or other areas within the Bay that need that dirt for resiliency efforts. And that would be coming from clean upland material and then barged out … And so, if we can pull that off in a pilot project, let us say maybe next year, then that sets us up for potentially …. domestic service as well as a new short marine highway here in the Bay.”

Marine highway projects support waterborne freight services that shift the transportation off roads and highways and on to vessels that reduce trucking congestion and pollution and have been supported by grants from the U.S. Maritime Administration (MARAD).

Establishing A Small Boatyard

Zortman said the Port is looking to establish a boatyard to service “…ferries, tugs, and other service provider vessels.” The Port partner is not yet public but “a boatyard that has successfully been awarded contracts from different entities up here in the Bay Area. They do not have a presence right now in the Bay Area, but they do in other parts of the West Coast.”

Concerts

Finally, the Port supports a weekly concert series: “We continue to give back to the community. We just kicked off our Saturday concert series again. So, every Saturday from April through November, we have a free concert down at the Port. We have also got our drone show…We try to give back where we can to the community on those kinds of events.”