Record Cargo Clogs Local Ports

It’s not quite the dockside equivalent of a SigAlert at the world’s third-largest seaport complex. But it’s close.

With international traffic at the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach running at record levels for the third straight year, shippers, longshoremen, trucking companies and railroads are struggling to keep up.

The peak cargo season usually doesn’t start until mid-July, when merchandise arrives for back-to-school and holiday sales. This year traffic is cresting early, driven by record levels of trade, fueled mainly by cargo shipments from China.

At the same time, there is a shortage of railroad freight cars and a severe lack of union crews to operate the ports’ cranes, trucks and container stackers. What’s more, new federal and international security regulations went into effect Thursday at the nation’s seaports, and the Coast Guard began boarding foreign vessels to make sure they met the new standards.

“We’re living on the edge,” said Dick McKenna, deputy executive director of the Marine Exchange, which monitors vessels entering and leaving the ports.

“Any little gurgle here could create a backlog.”

Many retailers prepared for the cargo crunch by beginning their deliveries earlier than usual, but some are concerned.

“We are getting e-mails from the shipping agents that there is a possibility for dock slowdowns,” said Larry Meyer, spokesman of Forever 21, a Los Angeles-based youth retailing chain.

McKenna and others say the single biggest problem appears to be a shortage of dockworkers because of retirements, smaller crews and people taking vacation around the Fourth of July.

The heavy cargo volume “wasn’t anticipated at the beginning of the year,” McKenna said. And though the ports’ busiest season typically begins later in the summer, “Certainly we’re ramping up a lot faster now.”

On Wednesday, the Marine Exchange said 42 vessels were in the twin ports, an additional 11 were anchored offshore, while 12 more vessels were due to arrive that day, and 51 more ships were expected Thursday to Sunday.

The boom is triggering concerns about whether enough dockworkers are on hand to unload the cargo.

The Marine Exchange warned Monday that the ports appeared to be on the verge of a major “congestion event,” and that growing labor shortages were occurring on the docks.

Port managers are hoping to hire as many as 1,500 part-time, nonunion apprentice workers to help meet the demand.

The Pacific Maritime Assn., which handles labor contracts and payrolls for shipping companies at West Coast ports, is negotiating this week with the International Longshore and Warehouse Union on how many new workers were needed and how soon they could be brought on board.

At the same time, Union Pacific Corp. and Burlington Northern Sante Fe Corp. -- two major railroads that carry goods from the ports across the country -- are reporting sharp drops in capacity because of labor shortages and other problems.

The Los Angeles and Long Beach ports have seen an increase in cargo container traffic over last year. The Long Beach port has seen a 14% increase in the first five months of 2004, compared with the same period a year ago; the Los Angeles port is up 4%.

One reason for increased traffic is a generation of new super- sized cargo ships that can carry up to 4,030 standard-size, 40-foot-long shipping containers, or nearly 40% more than the average freighter.

To try to handle all the extra traffic railroads have implemented massive hiring campaigns, mostly for the Southern California region. Union Pacific is adding 4,200 employees, almost twice as many as it hired last year. Burlington Northern Santa Fe is adding 1,700 conductors and is increasing its fleet size by more than 500 locomotives.

Still, the concern is whether these steps will be enough.

“This is something we are talking about all of the time. How are the terminals, rail lines and the freeways going to absorb all of this,” said Scott Dailey, a spokesman for APL Ltd., a subsidiary of Singapore-based Neptune Orient Lines that operates a large shipping terminal in San Pedro.

“This is usually our slow period ... but we are running at full capacity right now.”

Truckers, who handle about 70% of the freight arriving at Long Beach and Los Angeles ports, say they are already feeling the crunch in longer waiting times. About 15% of the nation’s international cargo is trucked on California freeways.

There is some hope that help is on the way to ease cargo traffic congestion, at least on the roads.

Tom Teofilo, vice president of the Pacific Merchants Shipping Assn., said the local ports would start moving more cargo at night and on weekends.

The change, long championed as a way to ease daytime traffic on local freeways, got a boost in early June when terminal operators said they would begin full-service nighttime and weekend operations at the two ports.

Some night shifts could be operating in 60 to 90 days, in time to ease the summer surge of cargo, he said.

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Times staff writer Dawn Wotapka contributed to this report.