Projo Biz Blog

Journal archive photo / Bob Breidenbach
Car importer NORAD is the main user of the port at the Quonset Business Park.

PROVIDENCE -- The state Senate has passed legislation that would create a commission to study ways to intensify shipping activity at the state-owned port in the Quonset Business Park.

The Senate approved the bill, sponsored by Sen. Paul E. Moura, on Wednesday. Yesterday, it was referred to the House Finance Committee.

The 10-member House and Senate commission would have a broad mandate to “study economic activity relating to port development.”

But Moura has said it would probably not focus much energy on the decade-old proposal to build a deep-water port for container ships, The Providence Journal reported last month.

“I don’t want to get bogged down in a discussion of a megacontainer-port at Quonset,” Moura said at the time. “I’m not closing the door on that discussion, but I don’t want to waste time."

The Finance Committee has not scheduled a hearing on the bill, Senate spokesman Greg Pare said today.

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