Some back-of-the-napkin calculations: The ship's got over 20k containers, so less than $10 per container. Shipping a container from Asia to Europe costs thousands of dollars, so passing through the canal is less than 1% of the cost. Sounds fair to me?

The ship in the video is not a container ship but a taker or bulk cargo ship, so you cannot calculate this way. But I am sure it is not much if you divide the toll fee by total shipping cost or even the value of the cargo. It was just the total sum that I found impressive.

Oh, good point - I mixed it up with Ever Given. Agreed $200k is a lot, but probably totally insignificant compared to the major costs (fuel, wear & tear).

Maintaining the channel seems to be a lot of work... like when ships crash into the bank and block it.

One interesting thing is the toll often fluctuates due to the oil price.

If the toll is deemed to be too high a vessel always has the option of going around the Cape.

Realistically it's always an option but the added time plus the additional wear on a vessel makes it undesirable.