Pacific City, OR, United States

Pacific City, OR: Submarine Cable Landing Point

Pacific City is a census-designated place in Tillamook County, Oregon, on the Pacific coast of the United States. Despite its small population of roughly 1,100 residents, the community serves as a landing point for a major transpacific submarine cable system. Its position on the Oregon coastline places it along one of the world's most active submarine cable corridors, connecting the continental United States directly to East Asian economies.

One submarine cable lands at Pacific City: the New Cross Pacific (NCP) Cable System. This single connection links the Oregon coast with China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, making Pacific City a direct transpacific gateway on the western edge of North America.

Cables Landing at Pacific City, OR

The New Cross Pacific (NCP) Cable System is the sole submarine cable landing at Pacific City. Stretching 13,618 kilometres, it reached ready-for-service (RFS) status in 2018. The cable connects the United States with four East Asian territories: China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Its considerable length reflects the breadth of the transpacific route it spans, running from the Oregon coast westward across the Pacific Ocean to serve some of the most heavily trafficked internet markets in Asia.

Regional Context

Within the United States, Pacific City is one of 160 submarine cable landing points, ranking among the top 69 percent of domestic landing points by cable count. Compared to high-density hubs such as Boca Raton, FL, and San Juan, PR — each hosting eight cables — or California locations like Hermosa Beach and Grover Beach with five and four cables respectively, Pacific City hosts a single cable. Its role is therefore that of a focused, single-system terminus rather than a multi-cable aggregation point.

Network Role

Pacific City functions as a transpacific terminus, anchoring the United States end of the New Cross Pacific Cable System and providing a direct path between the continental US and four major East Asian markets: China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. As a single-cable landing point, it does not serve the aggregation function seen at larger US hubs, but the NCP Cable System's 13,618-kilometre span and its 2018 RFS date represent a substantial transpacific link terminating on the Oregon coast.

The presence of a landing point in a small coastal community like Pacific City illustrates how submarine cable infrastructure is distributed across geographically varied sites along the US Pacific seaboard. In the broader United States submarine cable graph — 113 cables across 160 landing points — Pacific City contributes a dedicated transpacific path that directly ties the American northwest to East Asia.