Empty shelves in supermarkets and other stores are due in part to hundreds of thousands of shipping containers waiting to be unloaded at ports in Los Angeles, Long Beach, and other cities. According to market urbanist Scott Beyer, this backlog is due to a combination of labor unrest and NIMBYism.
More than 60 container ships are waiting outside the Port of Los Angeles for space to unload their cargo.
That’s certainly true in Portland, whose container port was completely shut down by labor disputes four years ago, and now is just beginning to function again. Moreover, trucks carrying containers out of Portland face some of the worst congestion in the country, partly due to anti-highway groups that oppose congestion relief on the grounds that it might lead people to drive more.
The Port of Coos Bay, Oregon has proposed to build a container terminal to take some of the pressure off of Los Angeles and Long Beach. But Coos Bay is almost 250 rail miles further from eastern markets than any other West Coast port, and half of those miles are in very poor condition that would require hundreds of millions of dollars in upgrades to make them competitive. It would cost far less money to build up Portland’s capacity, but Portland has an anti-growth mentality while Coos Bay does not.
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In 2020, West Coast ports from Seattle to Long Beach imported 45 percent of all container traffic in the country. But these ports face competition from two major sources. First, the Port of Vancouver, B.C., handled more container traffic than Seattle and Tacoma combined, putting most of it on trains that often headed in the U.S. Second, an expansion project that doubled the capacity of the Panama Canal in 2016 has made Gulf and Atlantic ports more competitive with those on the West Coast, particularly for goods that are less time sensitive.
If West Coast shipping was controlled exclusively by market demand, the ports and transportation facilities around them would be scrambling to accept new traffic. Instead, they are controlled mainly by political factors that are largely immune to such competitive considerations.
Pacific liberalism: Where it’s moer economical to have a ship sail 12000 miles than offload in Los Angeles….
Hold labor responsible. Hire independent investigators to make sure they’re actually working. Union labor dominates most civil construction, and mission creep, purposeful work slowdowns and outright laziness dominate the industry. In investigative videos done by news reporters, chronicling city construction work; employees spent as much as half their work day sitting about drinking coffee/not working. Excuses such as “Supply problems”, ground difficulties, etc constant foils, if supplies and equipment are unavailable for work, why are they being paid at all. By dragging construction to a sandstill the Boyz were getting paid for years despite building nothing and anyone who reports on it usually winds up in a stadium’s parking lot in a cement casket. It’s all part of a very corrupt, conniving cache of what basically amounts to a “Government-contractor industrial complex.” It’s the reason why stuff government builds cost more, often way more. People remember the news story of New York City and it’s building a park bathroom that cost $2 million. For that much money one would expect gold fixtures or modernist designs by Kohler. New York City Parks Commissioner Mitchell Silver says $2 million was a good deal. Meanwhile in privately managed Bryant Park, in the middle of Manhattan, their refurbished bathroom gets much more use and its recent cost just $271,000. When government spends other people’s money, it doesn’t need to worry about cost or speed, and when corruption and waste is discovered and talked about, seldom punished namely we don’t know whom to punish. Every decision is bogged down by time-wasting “public engagement,” inflated union wages, and time-killing work rules. Construction workers on government jobs sites make anywhere from 50-100 dollars an hour, even if materials/supplies never arrive, they sit on equipment waiting. Learned Helplessness is a pervasive problem in civil engineering.
To focus on US ports is, to be blunt, quite ignorant.
China has been regularly shutting down it’s ports in the name of a zero covid policy, has ongoing power problems, etc, etc, etc.
No amount of market-uber-alles can ever overcome a supply chain that has a fairly steady, predictable flow to one where originating ports do not load or ship for days and weeks, only to turn around and operated full throttle. That nothing to everything to nothing to everything is a logistics killer.
Do you have any idea how badly Las Vegas, San Fan and LA has decrepitated in the past two years? I get regular reports from someone employed in retail right on the Strip. Since Covid came to visit, the fat cats and Asian “whale” gamblers and tourists of yesteryear have been largely replaced by west coast gang-bangers. The result: stupendous impromptu pageants of street violence: stabbings, shootings, beat-downs, stompings, often in BROAD daylight. With restaurant closings, visitors have had to get their meals from McDonalds where they never get out of their car and convenience store snack shelves. A next generation of politically accepted; homeless addicts and psychotics appeared and formed LA-style campgrounds in the parking lots and nebulous zones between the massive casino properties. The grafitti cleaners can’t get ahead of the taggers. This is certainly not Bugsy Siegel’s town or China Town, nor even Steve Wynn’s. Western US cities has entered the Blade Runner phase of its destined-to-be rather brief existence. If the capital markets tank as expected this fall, you can see even more disorganization.
The problem with ports they spent decades acclimating on huge ships that got larger and larger. It sounds like a model of efficiency….except it’s not. It’s just a symptom of larger aspects of west US management and political fuck upatude… As ships got bigger, their logistical burdens became more problematic. Like any organism destined for extinction; they reach the peak of maximum size before ecosystems can no longer accommodate them. For centuries, sailing ships offered the fastest, best option for transporting goods and people. The Age of Sail (1571–1862) marked the reign of tall ships, with clipper ships representing the apex of commercial sailing’s progression. Smaller ships have advantages
– They can fit in marinas and smaller ports.
– By accommodating small ports, investment in heavy duty infrastructure is mitigated.
– Using military style offloading ramps trucks can haul containers without needing extensive crane operations.
– 20 foot shipping container is more accommodating of small ports, since shipping containers are already standardized they pose no concern and are lighter/easier to lift.
– By spreading geographic port locations, trucks/trains less likely to choke traffic.
Have no fear. This problem, like inflation, is just transitory. Harvard and Oxford educated Pete Buttigieg is Transportation Secretary and has massive logistics experience having dealt with big city traffic problems as mayor of South Bend. And now that he’s almost back from paternity leave, these piddling, transitory logistics issues will drop off as fast as his boss’s poll numbers.