PreviousWorld class seaport at 50
WELCOME BAHAMAS - GRAND BAHAMA - 2005
World class seaport at 50
Port shakes adversity, mourns founding father
Even as Freeport celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2005, it mourns the death of a founding father, Edward St George, a man who helped turn an idle bay and pine barren into one of the most successful shipping centres in the world, as well as a model residential community and a first-class tourist destination.
St George, formerly co-chairman of the Grand Bahama Port Authority (GBPA), died in Houston, TX, after heart surgery in February 2005. Earlier, he worked hard to put the island back on its feet after two hurricanes hit it within days of each other in September 2004.
Speaking of St George's lifelong commitment to Freeport, Prime Minister Perry Christie said the man's contribution was so large that "...you cannot stop Freeport now. It has become a community - both corporate and domestic - and it's just going to go on."
Earlier, Minister of State for Finance, Senator James Smith, said hurricanes Frances and Jeanne tested the strength not only of Freeport but of the nation as a whole in 2004. "The bright spot... is," Smith said, "how resilient the economy was and how quickly we were able to recover."
World class seaport
Freeport was established in August 1955, the dream of American financier Wallace Groves, following passage of the Hawksbill Creek Agreement. This extraordinary piece of legislation granted the fledgling GBPA exclusive rights to develop some 150,000 acres of land located in the centre of Grand Bahama for commercial and residential use.
The agreement guaranteed the authority freedom from taxes until 2015 and from excise taxes, stamp duties and most customs duties until 2054. As well, the government granted it the right to administer a 230-square-mile free-trade port. The GBPA still has the authority to issue business licenses, to own and operate casinos and to establish tourism in the area. For its part, the GBPA agreed to create a deep-water port and construct an airport, hospitals and schools. All this has been done.
In 1996, Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) Ltd, a subsidiary of Hutchison Whampoa of Hong Kong, owned by billionaire Li Ka-shing, acquired interests in several of the GBPA companies, including the Grand Bahama International Airport, Lucayan Harbour and the Grand Bahama Development Company.
Today, with the help of HPH, the Freeport Container Port has the capacity to handle 1.8 million TEUs (Twenty-foot Equivalent container Units) a year. Every day, ships arrive from, and depart to, the United States, the Caribbean, Mexico, South America, Europe, the Far East and Australia via Atlantic trade routes, and from the Pacific via the Panama canal.
After recent improvements, the container port now includes 120 acres of stacking area, more than 11,000 feet of berths, including three huge container berths at a depth of just over 50 feet, capable of handling the largest ships afloat. There is also a 52-foot deep channel and turning basin.
Shrugging off the inconvenience of hurricanes, GBPA announced that an expansion launched in 2003 was completed in February 2005 with the arrival of three big new cranes.
More than 350 feet high, these Hyundai Heavy Industry cranes can lift up to 71 tons, hoisting two containers at once, according to a company spokesperson. Other equipment includes mobile harbour cranes and 50 straddle carriers.
Freeport Harbour Company also operates a major ship repair facility and other marine operations in the complex. There are two fully serviced wet berths capable of handling vessels up to 1,000 feet long, together with two large floating docks, easily able to handle panamax vessels (ships built to maximum dimensions to transit the Panama canal).
The GBPA also intends to create a Caribbean "silicon valley" on a 700-acre tract of property between the seaport and the Grand Bahama International Airport. This area has been reserved as the Grand Bahama International Business Centre, which will feature a teleport, data centres and high-speed telecommunications networks, with all associated warehousing fulfillment and shipping services.
Even as the seaport continues to prosper, other projects are going forward in other parts of the booming island.
Old Bahama Bay
Out west, only 55 miles across the ocean from Palm Beach, FL, is Old Bahama Bay, a resort hotel with residential properties for sale, along with a 72-slip marina.
So well managed and maintained is the marina that it was awarded a "blue flag" early in 2005 by the Foundation for Environmental Education, a non-profit group dedicated to promoting environmental and safety standards in Europe, Canada, Australia and South Africa, as well as - more recently - in the Caribbean area. Old Bahama Bay is the second Bahamian marina to achieve this honour, the other being the Port Lucaya Marina.
An expansion is planned in the years ahead. Plans call for an additional 125 slips in the marina, which also offers on-site customs and immigration services. It is one of the few night navigable points of entry in The Bahamas.
Allyson Maynard Gibson, Minister of Financial Services and Investments, says Old Bahama Bay is in for "explosive growth? which will be completely redeveloped by one of the leading developers in the Florida market."
Maynard Gibson was referring to the Ginn company, which wants to develop a 2,000-acre tract of land between Old Bahama Bay and Bootle Bay, along what is known as the Settlement Point shoreline.
"A complete transformation is planned for west Grand Bahama, including the West End village, which will retain its charm and provide significant opportunities for Bahamians to develop entrepreneurship," said Maynard Gibson.
Complete transformation
By early 2005, The Ginn Corporation had submitted their proposals to all agencies of government and negotiations were going forward to hammer out a Heads of Agreement on the project, valued at more than $1 billion.
Referring to the project as "mind boggling," Prime Minister Christie said it would lead to a "major economic transformation of the entire island."
To provide housing for construction and other workers on this project, the government will purchase 200 acres of land near Bootle Bay to build an integrated community "allowing Bahamians to have land accessible to them for their homes as they move to work in this new venture."
The first phase will include the construction of a golf course, 1,000 single-family lots, a 400-unit condo-style hotel, a beach club, marina, swimming pool and tennis courts, along with other amenities.
At the same time, the Marriott Corporation had expressed an interest in building a 400-room timeshare facility in the Barbary Beach area and another 350-unit timeshare for Discovery Bay.
DEVCO'S long-term plans
If that were not enough, DEVCO, the port authority's real estate arm, is also active, planning the construction of affordable housing, middle-income homes and high-end projects, also in partnership with the Ginn company.
DEVCO looks ahead 15 to 20 years to the eventual development of the oceanfront land east of the Grand Lucayan Waterway, which could include three or four golf courses.
"We intend to build, own and manage at least two golf courses within the next five years," says Graham Torode, president and CEO of DEVCO.
"There's no oceanfront land left on the eastern seaboard worth speaking of. We have the baby boomer generation. Over the next 10 years the number of 55- to 60-year-olds is going to double or more (in the US)," he says
"We genuinely believe that we're standing on the threshold of another sustained economic boom for the island," said Torode.
Moving into movies
In February, The Bahamas signed an agreement with Disney Motion Picture Company for the filming of two major movies on Grand Bahama Island: Pirates of The Caribbean II and Pirates of The Caribbean III, to be filmed between May 2005 and January 2006.
This will result in an estimated 16,000 to 30,000 room nights being booked at Grand Bahama hotels during that period, according to the government. In all, the two films are expected to yield expenditures of about $30 million in Grand Bahama.
One reason for Disney's choice of venue was a decision by Gold Rock Creek Enterprises to develop a $26-million state-of-the-art movie-making complex on the site of the US government's old missile tracking base on Grand Bahama.
The first phase was a massive environmental cleanup, including landscaping, and a building programme that turned four old barracks-type buildings into offices.
Also included in the project is the construction of three sound stages and related infrastructure, says Paul Quigley, CEO of Gold Rock Film Studio and Theme Park. He heads a group of partners that includes Belgian film maker Hans Schutte and New York entertainment lawyer Michael Coloyer, formerly a chairman of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.
LNG proposals
Prime Minister Christie surprised some observers when he told a radio interviewer early in 2005 that the government intended to move ahead on proposals to create a liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility in The Bahamas, to supply gas to the Florida market via an underwater pipeline. Some environmentalists and political commentators strongly opposed such a development.
The Houston-based energy giant, Tractebel has proposed the Tractebel Calypso project - a $700-million LNG plant and pipeline from Freeport Harbour to Florida.
Meanwhile, Houston-based El Paso, the third-largest US gas producer, has unveiled plans for an LNG plant and pipeline from South Riding Point, Grand Bahama to Florida.
At the same time, AES Corporation, a power plant company that employees 60,000 people around the globe, has unveiled plans for a $1.3-billion LNG conversion plant and pipeline to Florida from Ocean Cay, a former aragonite mining island on the edge of the Gulf Stream, south of Bimini.
Floating mega-project
Meanwhile, a 15-part feasibility study is under way for development of Moon Bahamas, a mammoth undertaking by RJH Holdings.
RJH chairman and Moon Bahamas creator, Michael Henderson, intends to build five man-made islands off Grand Bahama's north coast. The islands will support development on a scale never before attempted, including a mega-yacht marina, a 12,000-suite hotel, an artificial reef, a casino and a huge wine cellar - all intended to be the largest ever built. The plan includes a monorail, four golf courses, ten cruise ship terminals and 50 restaurants.
With a truly out-of-this world design, the plan includes the construction of massive spheres, each holding 250 condominiums selling for $1.25 million each.
Each of the planned 88 spheres will house underground parking, private beach access, a gymnasium, indoor/outdoor swimming pools and jacuzzis. The project is expected to be completed in 2010 with estimated profits topping $33 billion.
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