Honda Import Terminal May Move to San Pedro

American Honda is negotiating to move its massive auto-receiving operation from the Port of Long Beach to the Port of Los Angeles, a move Long Beach officials say is “unfortunate” but of little consequence financially.

Although no formal agreement has been signed, the Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners last week took the first step toward establishing a terminal at the Port of Los Angeles.

The port director in Long Beach said there is another auto manufacturer in line to occupy the spot where Honda recently unloaded its millionth car.

“It’s unfortunate. We’d be sorry to see them go,” said Steve Dillenbeck, acting executive director at the Long Beach port. “(But) we will have a customer that will fill that space if they leave.”

The shift is the latest in a lively competition between the two ports that vie for each other’s tenants. Dillenbeck said Honda, which imports about 70,000 cars a year to Long Beach, wants a terminal of its own--something Long Beach is not prepared to give.

“If identity was more important to them, there was really no way we could satisfy them at this point,” he said.

The permit to revamp Berths 86 through 90 in San Pedro--approved by a 4-1 vote Wednesday by the Los Angeles Harbor Commission--will allow the Harbor Department to remove fences, scales and a prefabricated building and to install new fencing at the site. Officials said an actual lease agreement would still have to come before the commission for a vote and be approved by the City Council’s Commerce and Natural Energy Committee.

The move came over protests from San Pedro residents and business representatives, who said an auto terminal in the area could create a traffic mess. The idea also miffed several members of a merchant marine veterans group, who hoped to anchor a floating museum where Honda plans to move.

Harbor officials and representatives of American Honda Motor Co. Inc. said they have been negotiating a 10-year lease to use the site near the Los Angeles Maritime Museum for receiving automobiles.

“We have a preliminary agreement on the lease between Honda and the Port of Los Angeles,” said Kurt Antonius, manager of corporate public relations for American Honda.

Antonius said the autos would be taken off the ships, loaded onto trucks and taken directly to dealers. He said no processing, such as cleaning or repair, would take place at the terminal.

San Pedro residents and members of the San Pedro Peninsula Chamber of Commerce protested nonetheless.

“The proposed usage . . . for an auto-handling terminal would have a long-term impact on the neighboring community,” said G. Bud Hudson, president of the chamber. “We would request a public hearing be held with adequate advance notice . . . for public comment.”

Chamber officials and residents said trucks carrying cars from a major terminal could drastically impede traffic on Harbor Boulevard in San Pedro and local freeways, hampering local business and tourism.

“If they take 70,000 cars a year, 6,000 a month, they are going to have trucks moving cars out of there every day,” said Noah Modisett, president of the San Pedro Peninsula Home Owners Coalition, after the hearing.

The board’s action appears to have all but dashed the hopes of the U.S. Merchant Marine Veterans of World War II, who have campaigned since last year to anchor a floating museum at Berth 87, near the Los Angeles Maritime Museum. Members of the Long Beach-based national group defiantly tugged the mothballed merchant vessel Lane Victory into the port last summer--against the wishes of port officials--with the intention of creating a monument to comrades killed at sea.