WASHINGTON: The Port of Long Beach is studying land use to plan development of the marine terminal capacity needed to handle growing cargo volumes and larger vessels while remaining committed to environmental stewardship and community partnership.
The current phase of the study will continue through 2016. This effort will produce an evaluation process and tools the port’s staff and management, and the Board of Harbor Commissioners, will need to make informed decisions about how to prioritize land uses.
Creating a process to evaluate land use options will enable the port to adjust to rapid change in the commercial environment, a challenge facing all major gateways today. Oakland, for example, has combined three small, adjacent facilities into one large terminal in its Middle Harbor to more efficiently handle mega-ships with capacities as large as 18,000 twenty-foot-equivalent units.
Seattle and Tacoma last year formed the Northwest Seaport Alliance to jointly plan, develop and market facility development in the gateway. The effort is expected to result in consolidation of container terminals into fewer but larger facilities, and in the repurposing of some terminals for other types of cargo.
