Yahoo Autos Change in Lunch Breaks at 2 Southern California Ports Creating Cargo Delays
Longshore workers at Southern California’s two major ports have decided to eat lunch together at the same time. It seems like a nice way to enjoy down time with your colleagues, but it is angering shippers and truckers now stuck in long lines to pick up or unload cargo containers while workers chow down.
Normally, longshore workers at the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach stagger their lunch breaks to make sure someone is around to load or unload containers from waiting trucks. But starting March 15, dockworkers decided to change their dining habits and leave at the same time.
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Now terminals shut down for at least one hour at noon and another hour at dinner time, keeping frustrated cargo container truck drivers waiting longer.
Port observers believe the lunch schedule change is in reaction to the drawn-out, 10-month-long contract negotiations between the union representing 22,000 longshore workers and their employers. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union, representing the workers, and the Pacific Maritime Association, comprising 70 terminal operators employing the dockworkers at 29 West Coast ports, have been talking in San Francisco since May 2022 to negotiate a contract that expired July 1.
The uncertainty surrounding the contract negotiations comes at a time when shippers are negotiating their annual contracts with maritime companies that own and operate the cargo container vessels. New contracts determine shipping rates and where cargo containers land for the next year. Many are deciding to avoid the West Coast and opt for East Coast ports.
“We want to see some normalcy returned to the harbors,” said Matt Schrap, chief executive officer of the Harbor Trucking Association, whose members collect cargo at the ports. ”We want shippers to have confidence despite the challenging business environment in California. Now there are additional things making them avoid this gateway. We want the cargo to land here.”
Even before contract negotiations hit a snag, shippers started avoiding the two ports because there was a traffic jam of ships anchored off the Southern California coast in late 2021 and early 2022 as imports surged following the COVID-19 pandemic factory shutdowns.
In early 2022, there were 109 cargo container vessels anchored or drifting off the coast waiting for a berth to unload and pick up freight. Cargo containers were stacked on the docks for as long as eight days waiting to be picked up. Rail yard container dwell times peaked at 11 to 12 days. Most of that kind of logjam has been cleared, but warehouses in Southern California are filled to the brim with merchandise.
A few years ago, about 40 percent of all cargo containers coming from Asia were unloaded at the two ports. That has dipped to 36 percent, port experts said. Gene Seroka, the executive director of the Port of Los Angeles, recently shared at a press conference that he has been crisscrossing the country to win back business to Southern California.
