Page 15: of Maritime Logistics Professional Magazine (Sep/Oct 2017)

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New POLB Executive Director Mario Cordero weighs in o from his new West Coast chair, on the most pressing is- sues of the day. Arguably the industry authority from both the regulatory and commercial sides of the equation, his opinion carries weight and, sometimes, surprises.

One of the issues that the Northwest Seaport Alliance [Ta- coma and Seattle] struggles with is when and how and how to pay for opening up for night operations. They’d love to open up for night operations, but they need to fgure out who’s going to pay for it. How many hours a day are your ports open right now?

Presently, we do have night gates here at the Port of Long

Beach. And we have it, that being facilitated by way of the

Pier Pass program, which as you know, involves a traffc miti- area where people could pick up and return them. That creates gation fee to address this issue about paying for that night effciency and that maximizes productivity. In this country, gate. So having said all that, what we need is night gates that we have three major equipment operators. So if we get those are predictable. I’m talking about something that’s sustainable people together to fnd a common ground, then I think we’ll and predictable. So the good news is we do have night gates make some real productive steps. now that we have been moving forward, but it’s not at the point that I believe has been maximized in order to prepare You said that your goal is, in the very near future, to go to us to move the kind of volume that we’re expecting. How you 50 percent rail off the dock. measure the success of a night gate is in the truck turn time. Our goal is 50 percent – in the near future, 35 percent and

Right now this is a challenge for many gateways, and we’ve then, ultimately 50 percent. It’s absolutely paramount to have made some movement on that, but at the end of the day, I think an inland connectivity.

to your point, the real question is “Who’s going to pay for it?” Here in Long Beach and this greater port called LA/Long Let’s talk about CAAP – the California Clear Air Action

Beach, Pier Pass was an answer to that. But again, we still Plan. The ports have already done a remarkable job and I have to fne tune that so that, again, we have night gates that think the record speaks for itself. All the low-hanging fruit are predictable and true night gates, because you’re not going is gone. And the last 3 to 4 percent is going to be 5 times to be able to move this cargo between 8 and 5. as expensive as the frst 95 percent. Can you get to this zero percent [port emissions] in 2030?

Let’s shift gears a little bit. When you think about chassis, I believe we can. I think, in fact, the question is in terms of on the surface, it might not be the most interesting topic whether or not the technology is available by that time. If you in the world. But, on the intermodal docks, it is one of the look forward to 2030, which is the goal that is set for cargo most important. Tell us about your ideal chassis pool and handling equipment, and the 2035 goal for zero-emission why it works best. trucks, technology is moving so fast that I’m very optimistic

Sometimes, there’s a misperception that we don’t have that option will be there. The question is what will be the enough chassis. For example, in the Southern California Port cost and who’s going to pay for it. Those are fair questions.

Complex, I think we have somewhere in the neighborhood So, for us, it’s a full court press to seek government funding of from 90 to 100,000 chassis. When a problem does occur, to achieve this goal. That is the option that we are seeking, it’s not because of not enough chassis, it’s a misallocation of because again, this whole issue of the environmental push chassis assets. That mutual manager – what we call a ‘gray to reduce emission is a politically-captured event. It’s not pool’ – would have the ability to have chassis at like a staging just happening in California – it’s happening throughout the www.maritimelogisticsprofessional.com 15

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