Lest we get swept away in the excitement of the opening of the expanded Panama Canal in 2016, it is important to bid a not-so-fond farewell to a challenging 2015.
In 2015, U.S. West Coast ports struggled as labor issues caused severe ripples across the U.S. economy. Ports everywhere were overwhelmed by the weight of congestion even before the canal expansion and vessel “cascading” brought the full onslaught of larger ships. Port truckers fought to protect their livelihoods.
Ports clamored for federal funding for land-side and water-side projects, but at the same time resisted increased federal roles in ending labor disputes and congestion.
For 2016, U.S. ports will likely exhibit the one trait other than controversy that binds them — resiliency.
In 2016, U.S. ports will likely continue to refine their awareness that operational issues are “local,” funding sources are increasingly “state,” and establishment of a national port policy is “federal,” with the hope that, for the latter, a vehicle may arise — perhaps the National Freight Strategic Plan — that provides discussion of true reform.
But hopefully in 2016, ports will move back toward theirs roots. As I recently wrote in the Virginia Policy Review in “Public Policy and Our Nation’s Harbors: A Critical Time for Tough Choices,” as ports have promoted themselves as economic engines, integral parts of an all-encompassing national transportation structure, perhaps they have lost their identity.
Ports must embrace the fact that they are not just the pieces of a puzzle that never has been put together well, but are the primary conduits of our nation’s trade, vital to economic well-being, our lives. Because their history is unique, as are their infrastructure and operations, policies that attempt to relegate U.S. ports to mere ingredients in a larger and ill-defined transportation “recipe,” demand, in the words of Shakespeare, a sea change.
J. Stanley Payne, Principal, Summit Strategic Partners