National City May Be Site for Container Port

A vacant Port District site in National City that is being sought as a terminal location by an imported car handler is being considered by a South Korean company that wants to build a container cargo loading facility.

A Port District spokesman confirmed Monday that Far Eastern Shipping of Seoul has proposed opening negotiations to build a 125-acre container cargo facility at the 24th Street Terminal in National City. If built, it would be San Diego Bay’s first major container cargo dock.

The dock is the first of its kind proposed for San Diego Bay in at least seven years, a port spokesman said. Meanwhile, container freight handling has increasingly concentrated around the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports.

The South Koreans face several obstacles in acquiring the site. First, the property includes a 38-acre parcel being negotiated for by Pasha Group of Corte Madera, a major processor of imported cars from Japan and Europe.

Although Pasha does not have exclusive negotiating rights for the port property, the company hopes to have an agreement signed with the San Diego port district by the end of 1989 that would give it control of the site, senior vice president Jim Hull said Monday. Pasha plans a facility that would receive 50,000 to 70,000 cars annually from the Orient and Europe.

Hull said Monday that he has no knowledge of the South Korean firm’s proposal and could not comment on whether competition could develop between the two companies for the site.

Another obstacle for the South Koreans is that they have asked for further dredging of the site’s bayfront to enable bigger ships to make port calls.

The problem with additional dredging is that the harbor area is the scene of copper concentrate pollution, port spokesman Dan Wilkens said. Because dredging would probably further disperse the pollution, permission from environmental agencies is not likely until the site is cleaned up, he said.

But, before the cleanup can begin, liability for the pollution has to be determined. And liability is still being disputed by the Port District and Patco, a previous tenant the port says is responsible.

Last but not least, National City opposes industrial development of the site. Mayor George Waters said the city wants to build a tourist attraction with the retail-restaurant theme concept of San Diego’s Seaport Village.

Waters said he was unfamiliar with details of the South Korean proposal but said National City will probably go along with a Pasha terminal on the condition that it vacates the tourism-designated location after five years when construction on the Seaport Village-like development is tentatively planned.

Details about the South Korean proposal were scarce Monday. Officials at J.H. Cohn & Co. of San Diego, which so far has represented the South Koreans in discussions with the port, did not return telephone calls Monday.

Port spokesman Dan Wilkens said he had little information on the South Korean company and knows of no other terminal operations it is involved in. The cargo that would be shipped in the containers was also the source of speculation. San Diego’s biggest cargo exports now are potash and wheat from the Central Valley, which are shipped in bulk.

Pasha has said its National City terminal would employ about 100 and generate $1 million to $1.4 million in lease revenues annually for the port. The San Diego facility would be Pasha’s fourth terminal. The company handles about 300,000 cars a year in facilities in Long Beach, Richmond, Calif., and Philadelphia, Hull said.

Pasha has taken longer than expected to make a deal with the San Diego port. Pasha had said earlier this year that it hoped to have a lease signed by the end of June after the port gave conceptual approval to Pasha’s proposal in April.

Some observers had claimed that Pasha was using the San Diego negotiations to extract a better lease deal from the Long Beach port district, where Pasha maintains an 80-acre facility. Pasha denied the allegations and said it is negotiating with the San Diego port in good faith.