Michigan has only one container-capable port, the port of Monroe, shown below. It’s small, connected to Lake Erie via a channel that’s 500 ft wide but only 21 feet deep. This is OK for handling Great Lakes, wide-bottom rafts and some shallow draft barges, but it is too shallow to handle ocean going vessels, or even larger Great Lakes ships. The only way Port Monroe takes containers is by pushing them onto rafts that are then drawn by tug, typically to Canada. The port has been neglected due to a belief, popular with Michigan Democrats, that fast rail traffic is the future success, while ports are the past. This is a popular belief in Europe, Japan, and China, but planes, cars, and ships make more sense in the US I think, in part because of regulations that prevent rail-carried mail. A nice thing about planes and ships is we don’t buy land, nor maintain tracks.

In term of price per pound mile, ships are vastly cheaper than any other system, especially big ships. But big ships need deep water ports, ideally ports with good road (or rail) connections, and good connections to the sea. Monroe has good road and rail connections, and Detroit does too. Detroit is an obvious city for a hub, centrally located on the narrows between the US and Canada, but Detroit has no port infrastructure currently, and shows no interest in adding any. That leaves Monroe, pretty bad, but better than nothing.

I would like to see the Port Monroe improved, with cranes and more storage area, and with the channel deepened to handle seaway – max vessels of 27 feet draft so we could handle ocean- cargo business, and cruise ships — a ferry would be nice too. With an improved Michigan port, our exports would not have to be trucked to New York for shipment, and we would be able to import machinery and steel without it having to stop in New York, or Montreal. The lack of a decent port is why Detroit is the most expensive major US city in terms of the cost of international trade.

Monroe has the space for improvement, and they got a recent USDoT grant of $15 million to improve. It’s covered the building of a new dock, and is expect to provide for some berths for Coast Guard ships and tugs (needed). With the new dock, there’s rumors that Monroe could be a decent way to export windmills components and other items that are too large for bridges and unsuitable to major ships. We’ll see how things develop.

Robert Buxbaum August 26, 2026