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You might want to walk away from Ports to make your point because Port of Houston ranks higher than any port city being discussed. The Port of New Orleans is important, but it's kinda embarrassing to try proving the point by asking if I realize the importance of the Port of New Orleans when Port of Houston is a more highly ranked port in every category.
Controlling the mouth of the Mississippi was important 300 years when railroads and highways did not exist. But it is no longer 300 years ago and controlling the mouth of the Mississippi means far less today.
TBH Ports does not have to be fully "coastal". In fact, the 3 largest ports in western Europe (Hamburg, Antwerp, Rotterdam) doesn't have any coast line to them. If anything Amsterdam and Dan Haag are both more "coastal city" than Rotterdam, but Rotterdam has far larger maritime presence than the other two.
Quote:
Originally Posted by atadytic19
The flaw in that point is the area of the ship channel isn't the only area of the city that is open to the coast. In fact I wouldn't even consider the ship channel as being coastal. It is one of those up-river deals.
What I am talking about is the portions of Houston City along the bay. People forget that the city limits extends to Nassau and Galveston Bay. The NASA/ Clearlake area are not independent cities, they are within Houston city limits.
You and Ion are probably like me and don't have yalls own boats, but that area is huge for boating/sailing/yachting, whatever it is called. It's one of the largest marina communities on the Gulf Coast.
That area is just cove after cove of marinas. Again we are not boat people so you don't go to Houston for that but just because you don't know about Houston coastal activities doesn't mean it isn't there.
Houston probably is more involved in these coast activities than any city on the list. I don't know of any marinas in Seattle or Baltimore, but I am not a boat person and I think going out on those little things are beyond boring.
That is not quite accurate. The freight comes from the Gulf through Lake Borgne then through Pontchartrain then from there it cuts through to the Mississippi via man made channels.
It's the same route Native Americans took for thousands of years prior to European arrival.
The "coastal" stuff in Houston are not exactly within city limit, though...Kemah or Baytown (and definitely Galveston) are not Houston...
It's definitely more coastal than NOLA either way. NOLA is a river port whereas Houston is your typical "inland harbor" port.
Side note - I grew up in Houston and now live near Baltimore - both have maritime presence but it's just not Seattle, which is literally surrounded by large bodies of water on two side.
Now, if the question is metro area - Houston wins easily...it's literally the only metro area on this list that touches an ocean directly (Gulf of Mexico is part of Atlantic Ocean...).
...and there is a 1000 foot Great Lakes-specific freighter.
There’s several 1000+ footers on the Great Lakes. I believe the largest cruise ship is about 600ft atm. You could definitely get a 900+ ft cruise ship into those ports, there’s just not a market for cruise ships with that capacity.
TBH Ports does not have to be fully "coastal". In fact, the 3 largest ports in western Europe (Hamburg, Antwerp, Rotterdam) doesn't have any coast line to them. If anything Amsterdam and Dan Haag are both more "coastal city" than Rotterdam, but Rotterdam has far larger maritime presence than the other two.
The "coastal" stuff in Houston are not exactly within city limit, though...Kemah or Baytown (and definitely Galveston) are not Houston...
It's definitely more coastal than NOLA either way. NOLA is a river port whereas Houston is your typical "inland harbor" port.
Side note - I grew up in Houston and now live near Baltimore - both have maritime presence but it's just not Seattle, which is literally surrounded by large bodies of water on two side.
Now, if the question is metro area - Houston wins easily...it's literally the only metro area on this list that touches an ocean directly (Gulf of Mexico is part of Atlantic Ocean...).
That's why I told him to lay off ports to make his point. It didn't make sense either way. On the one hand New Orleans port is on a River, and on the other hand his argument about importance fell flat considering Houston ranks higher on any port metric.
Located in southeast Texas and spanning Harris, Chambers, and Galveston Counties, Houston Ship Channel is the busiest deep-draft waterway in the United States. According to U.S. Maritime Administration data, the annual deep-water vessel activity at the Port of Houston is nearly equivalent to the combined totals for the next three largest U.S. ports – Los Angeles, Long Beach, and New York/New Jersey
And you are incorrect on Houston city limits. I never said Baytown or Galveston was in the city. That's silly. I said the City limits of Houston extend to the Bay, which it does. Clear lake is a neighborhood in the city of Houston. It bounds the Galveston Bayand it straddles Harris and Galveston counties. If you lived in Houston you probably spoke of the clear lake area as it's own city, but that is still city of Houston
I'm aware you can take cruises throughout the Great Lakes. The largest cruise ship in the Great Lakes is the Viking Octantis at 672' long and ~30,000 GT or about 1/3rd the size of the 3 cruise ships that operate out of Baltimore. Seattle & Houston get even bigger cruise ships than that because they don't have air draft restrictions.
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Originally Posted by Losfrisco
...and there is a 1000 foot Great Lakes-specific freighter.
The Great Lakes ~1000' bulk carriers max out at ~80,000 GT.
Seattle & Baltimore get container ships in the ~150,000 GT range, and bulk carriers well in excess of 200,000 GT. Houston hasn't dredged so it's limited to 45' drafts but makes up for smaller ships with sheer volume.
So again, the Great Lakes can accommodate "decent sized" ships. But what was "decent sized" in the early 20th century, is small relative today's norms.
Lake Pontchartrain is the ocean you guys know that right? (Even more so when you realize the northern 1/2 of NOLA is landfill, Jackson sq is about 2 miles from the original coastline)
You may as well call Tampa inland
But yeah all these cities except Chicago and Houston are obviously coastal.
Last edited by btownboss4; 04-24-2023 at 05:40 PM..
Houston and NOLA by a long shot lol. Both are by far the closest to the ocean. Chicago shouldn’t even be an option in this poll. Lake Michigan isn’t an ocean.
I'm just going to jump in and remind people who never left the French Quarter that Lake Ponchartrain isn't a lake, it's an estuary. That means it's connected to the open ocean. You can see dolphins there. And it's in the city limits. Lakeview is a developed neighborhood.
Also the port of New Orleans isn't really the port of New Orleans, the port system between New Orleans and Baton Rouge is the Port of South Louisiana and it's the second or first busiest port depending on how you measure it.
Not really. Chicago's lakefront location has been largely incidental to its economic success, besides its initial establishment as a portage, its early boom around timber trading, or later steel production. By 1860, when Chicago broke into the top-10-cities list, it was already "the principal transshipment point between eastern and western rail networks" (Encyclopedia of Chicago). It's one big reason why so much of Chicago's lakefront was available for parkland -- there weren't many competing profitable uses that had to be bought out. The lakes were instrumental in one way: forcing rail/road travel between New England and the Upper Midwest to transit Chicago.
There are some bulk goods that do transit the Great Lakes, but this recent thread went over why the lakes are only a marginal shipping route today.
Whether it be "coastal" or not, I guess, Chicago and Seattle have the most beautiful land leading up to water, by far. For Chicago's magnificent "shoreline", there is not a river, or an estuary in the way of what lies before it...nothing but water, as far as the eye can see. No sharks at the beach, either.
I'm just going to jump in and remind people who never left the French Quarter that Lake Ponchartrain isn't a lake, it's an estuary. That means it's connected to the open ocean. You can see dolphins there. And it's in the city limits. Lakeview is a developed neighborhood.
Also the port of New Orleans isn't really the port of New Orleans, the port system between New Orleans and Baton Rouge is the Port of South Louisiana and it's the second or first busiest port depending on how you measure it.
Well, as you can see, stuff like that only appears to matter if you're on the east or west coast.
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