Delaware wants to enter what to this point has been a proxy war waged in court by upriver ports against the state’s plans to build a modern container terminal on the Delaware River at Edgemoor.
This week, the Diamond State Port Corp., the quasi-public entity that oversees the Port of Wilmington, filed a motion to intervene in a lawsuit filed by upriver ports against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The lawsuit has successfully blocked permits necessary for the state’s planned construction of a new, $635 million container terminal at Edgemoor.
Last month, a judge presiding over the lawsuit ruled that the Army Corps had not followed its own rules in approving permits necessary for Delaware’s port plans. The ruling revoked the permits and amounted to a massive setback in Delaware’s port plans.
The project is being funded by a mix of state and federal dollars as well as a partnership with Enstructure, a private company that operates the current port and would operate the new facility at Edgemoor. Officials have described the port expansion as the most important new infrastructure project in Delaware since Route 1 and hope it will create thousands of jobs.