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North America Ports Report Record Traffic

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Times Staff Writer

Every major container seaport in North America handled more cargo in 2005 than ever before as trade with Asia continued to swell and importers looked for alternatives to Southern California’s crowded docks.

The growth was so brisk and spread so uniformly along the Pacific, Atlantic and Gulf coasts that some observers are worried other regions will see the kind of congestion that brought the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach near a standstill in 2004.

In 2005, Los Angeles and Long Beach, by far the nation’s busiest harbor complex, handled 14.2 million containers, an increase of 8% from 2004, without that year’s cargo tie-ups. But business in other places grew even faster last year as retailers diversified their ports of entry, in part to avoid the possibility of another floating traffic jam in Southern California.

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Despite the rapid expansion of recent years in international trade, particularly with China and India, few expected the increases they saw in 2005.

“These cargo volumes are just beyond belief,” said Aaron Ellis, spokesman for the American Assn. of Port Authorities. “Our ports need to marshal as much of their resources as possible to handle the surges in cargo volume we’ve been seeing.”

Importer Wen Chang found that out last year when he toyed with the idea of using Portland, Ore., or the San Francisco Bay Area instead of Long Beach to bring in the custom wheels, auto and truck accessories and other products that his company, Trade Union International, manufactures in China.

Those ports were becoming nearly as busy as Southern California’s, Chang discovered, plus he would need to foot the additional cost of trucking his products to Montclair, where the company is based.

“That’s not a solution,” said Chang, whose 85-employee company has $45 million to $55 million in annual sales. “We really need to have our state and federal government face this and help find a solution.”

Otherwise the flow of goods will be so backed up and inefficient that “everyone will become the victim,” he said.

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For more than 20 years, only three North American ports -- Los Angeles, Long Beach and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey -- handled 2 million or more cargo containers annually, as measured in 20-foot equivalents, the maritime industry standard for counting cargo boxes that vary in size. The Port of Oakland joined them in 2004, and last year three more ports breached the mark or came within two ships’ cargos of it: Tacoma, Wash. (2.1 million), the Virginia Port Authority (1.98 million) and Charleston, S.C. (1.98 million).

“It’s simple. We are continuing to see record levels of cargo coming here from Asia, and that trend is going to continue into this year,” said Steve Coleman, spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

The nationwide boom is creating fears that ports aren’t investing enough to process the heavier traffic and might develop the sorts of snarls that delayed import deliveries through Southern California in 2004.

The Los Angeles and Long Beach harbors steered clear in 2005 through a sweeping operational overhaul, which added thousands of dockworkers, opened cargo terminals on nights and Saturdays and levied fees on cargo moving during peak hours.

Serious congestion would occur first along the West Coast, according to a Pennsylvania State University analysis of container port capacity in 2005, “and then cause a domino effect as East and Gulf coast ports see higher-than-expected volumes and subsequently experience their own capacity and service problems.”

Michael Maloni, the report’s author and a professor specializing in supply chain management, said, “The point is that there isn’t enough excess capacity systemwide now -- across all the ports -- to handle any breakdown at any large port.”

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Maloni’s study polled officials from 24 ports that handle about 84% of North American container traffic. The study concluded that the facilities were underestimating growth by as many as 11 million containers over the next 15 years.

Ellis said ports across North America were spending an average of more than $2 billion a year on cranes and other cargo-handling equipment, computers and software to keep up with the traffic.

Even so, seaport analyst Anne Van Praagh of Moody’s Investors Service said, “we are still having trouble keeping pace with demand.”

Port officials say they’re doing their best to keep ahead.

“Ports across the country are not only expanding their facilities; they are building new terminals to be able to handle these greater volumes,” said the port association’s Ellis. “That’s become quite a trend around the country.”

At the Port of Charleston, where 25% of the volume comes from Asia, new cranes and other equipment that will allow containers to be stacked higher will begin arriving in June.

“We saw broad growth over the entire year. We’re not at capacity, but we need to expand,” said Byron Miller, spokesman for the South Carolina State Port Authority.

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Tacoma’s port will spend $434 million over the next five years on capital improvements and expansion projects.

“One thing is clear about 2005 and the foreseeable future, and that is that international trade will continue to grow and our transportation system must grow with it,” said Timothy J. Farrell, the port’s executive director.

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Cargo crush

Here are North America’s busiest container ports.

(In millions of TEUs*)

Los Angeles

2005: 7.5

2004: 7.3

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Long Beach

2005: 6.7

2004: 5.8

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New York/New Jersey

2005: 4.8 (Estimate)

2004: 4.5

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Oakland

2005: 2.3

2004: 2.0

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Tacoma, Wash.

2005: 2.1

2004: 1.8

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Charleston, S.C.

2005: 2.0

2004: 1.9

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Virginia**

2005: 2.0

2004: 1.8

---

Seattle

2005: 1.9

2004: 1.6

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Savannah, Ga.

2005: 1.8

2004: 1.6

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Vancouver, Canada

2005: 1.8

2004: 1.7

*Twenty-foot-equivalent units, the standard size of measurement for shipping containers.

**The port authority in the Chesapeake Bay area serves Hampton Roads, Newport News, Portsmouth and Norfolk.

Sources: The ports

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