Port of Los Angeles

Port of Los Angeles

General Information
Founded	December 9, 1907
Coordinates  - Latitude  - Longitude	33º42'39" N 118º14'59" W
Area  - Total  - Land  - Water	7500 acres 4200 acres 3300 acres
Available Berths	270
Vessel Arrivals	2,813 (FY 2004)
Annual container volume	7.3 million TEUs (FY 2005)
Annual cargo tonnage	162.1 million metric revenue tons (FY 2005)
Value of cargo handled	$148.5 billion USD (CY 2004)
Cruise Traffic	1.10 million passengers (FY 2005)
Total Operating Revenue	$351.5 million USD (FY 2004)
Net Income	$90.9 million USD (FY 2004)
Board of Harbor Commissioners
President Vice President	S. David Freeman Jerilyn López Mendoza
Commissioners	Kaylynn L. Kim Douglas P. Krause Joseph R. Radisich
Executive Director	Geraldine Knatz
Official Website

USGS Satellite picture of a portion of the Port of Los Angeles, including Pier 400, Reservation Point, and port facilities in San Pedro, March 29, 2004

The Port of Los Angeles is located on San Pedro Bay in the San Pedro neighborhood of Los Angeles, approximately 20 miles (30 km) south of downtown. Also called Los Angeles Harbor and WORLDPORT LA, the port complex occupies 7,500 acres (30 km²) of land and water along 43 miles (69 km) of waterfront. It adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. It is the busiest port in the entire United States, and employs over 16,000 people.

History

The LA harbor, 1899.

The south-facing San Pedro Bay was originally a shallow mudflat, too soft to support a wharf. Visiting ships had two choices: stay far out at anchor and have their goods and passengers ferried to shore; or beach themselves. That sticky process is described in Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana, Jr., who was a crewmember on an 1834 voyage that visited San Pedro Bay. Phineas Banning greatly improved shipping when he dredged the channel to Wilmington in 1871 to a depth of 10 feet. The port handled 50,000 tons of shipping that year. Banning owned a stagecoach line with routes connecting San Pedro to Salt Lake City, Utah and to Yuma, Arizona, and in 1868 he built a railroad to connect San Pedro Bay to Los Angeles, the first in the area.

Port of Los Angeles, 1913.

After Banning's death in 1885 his sons pursued their interests in promoting the port, which handled 500,000 tons of shipping in that year. The Southern Pacific Railroad and Collis P. Huntington wanted to create Port Los Angeles at Santa Monica, and built the Long Wharf there in 1893. However the Los Angeles Times publisher Harrison Gray Otis and U.S. Senator Stephen White pushed for federal support of the Port of Los Angeles at San Pedro Bay. The matter was settled when San Pedro was endorsed in 1897 by a commission headed by Rear Admiral John C. Walker (who later went to become the chair of the Isthmian Canal Commission in 1904). With U.S government support breakwater construction began in 1899 and the area was annexed to Los Angeles in 1909. The Harbor Commission was founded in 1907.

In 1912 the Southern Pacific Railroad completed its first major wharf at the port. During the 1920s, the port passed San Francisco as the west coast's busiest seaport. During WWII the port was primarily used for shipbuilding, employing more than 90,000 people. In 1959, Matson Navigation Company's Hawaiian Merchant delivered 20 containers to the port, beginning the shift to containerization at the port. The opening of the Vincent Thomas Bridge in 1963 greatly improved access to Terminal Island and allowed to increased traffic and further expansion of the port.

Port district

The port district is an independent, self-supporting department of the government of the City of Los Angeles. The Port is under the control of a five-member Board of Harbor Commissioners appointed by the Mayor and approved by the City Council, and is administered by an executive director.

Shipping

The container volume was 7.4 million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) in fiscal year 2004 and 6.7 million TEUs in fiscal year 2003. The Port is the busiest port in the United States by container volume, the 8th busiest containerport in the world and the 5th busiest internationally when combined with the neighboring Port of Long Beach. The top trading partners in 2004 were

1. China ($68.8 billion)
2. Japan ($24.1 billion)
3. Taiwan ($10.8 billion)
4. Thailand ($6.7 billion)
5. South Korea ($5.6 billion)

The most imported types of goods were, in order: furniture; apparel; toys and sporting goods; vehicle and vehicle parts; and electronic products.

From 2002 to the present, the Port has had a large backlog of ships waiting to be unloaded at any given time. Many analysts believe that the Port's traffic may have exceeded its physical capacity as well as the capacity of local freeway and railroad systems. The chronic congestion at the Port is beginning to cause ripple effects throughout the American economy and is disrupting Just In Time inventory practices at many companies.

The port is served by the Pacific Harbor Line (PHL) railroad. From the PHL the intermodal railroad cars go north to Los Angeles via the Alameda Corridor.

Cruise ships

The Port of Los Angeles is the largest cruise ship center on the West Coast of the United States and contains three ship berths transporting over 1 million passengers annually. The newly renovated World Cruise Center is claimed to be "the nation's most secure cruise passenger complex". The complex has a security patrolled long term parking lot with 2560 stalls. On days when cruises depart or arrive, courtesy shuttles transport passengers and luggage between the parking lot and the terminal.

Berth 91 at World Cruise Center

Environment

China Shipping Alternative Marine Power (AMP) with the Vincent St. Thomas Bridge, Catalina Express, and Diamond Princess in the background

That shipping volume comes with a cost: air pollution. Container ships burning low quality bunker fuel idle dockside because most have no capability to connect to shore-generated electricity. Diesel-powered semi-trailer trucks and locomotives idle while waiting to be loaded and unloaded. The local air quality regulatory agency did a study that found that air pollution from the port is responsible for 2,000 cases of cancer per million people (25 per million is the upper limit sought by regulators). The 47 tons of nitrogen oxides generated daily by port marine vessels nearly equals the amount emitted by the 350 largest factories and refineries in the region, and that number is expected to increase 70% by 2022.

A $2.8 million Port of Los Angeles Clean Air Program (POLACAP) initiative was implemented by the Board of Harbor Commissioners in October 2002 for terminal and ship operations programs targeted at reducing polluting emissions from vessels and cargo handling equipment.

To accelerate implementation of emission reductions through the utilization of new and cleaner-burning equipment, the Port is has allocated more than $52 million in additional funding for the POLACAP through 2008.

External links

• Official Port of Los Angeles Website
• Bridge to Breakwater Development Website
• Harbor Vision Task Force (working to reduce port-related pollution)
• Maritime Law (La Cruise Ship Lawyers Resources)

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