Oakland Port Files for Bankruptcy after Tenant Ends Lease

Oakland's Outer Harbor Terminal filed for Chapter 11 protection on Monday, two weeks after one of its biggest tenants said it was terminating a 50-year lease with the northern California port.

 

Last month, Ports America, one of the largest marine cargo operators in the country, said it was shifting its business from the Oakland port to other cities along the West Coast, including Los Angeles and Long Beach.

 

In a Chapter 11 petition filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware, Outer Harbor Terminal, which operates part of the Oakland port, listed both assets and liabilities of between $100 million and $500 million.

 

The Port of Oakland, located on the shore of San Francisco Bay, was one of the first ports in the world to specialize in intermodal container operations, but it is struggling to accommodate increasingly larger ships.