Mexican ports could take traffic from L.A
Los Angeles Business Journal, August 16, 2004 by David Greenberg
Mexico has been expanding its port operations at such a rapid pace that it could be siphoning away a significant amount of business from the ports of
Los Angeles and Long Beach within several years, according to a confidential study just compiled by the L.A. port.
The Port of Lazaro Card##as, on the Pacific coast in southern Mexico, is the most immediate threat. It has beefed up capacity and recently completed
test runs from Asian importers as an alternative route to the Midwest and the East Coast.
Volume at Lazaro Card##as is expected to increase to 280,000 20-foot equivalent units this year, from a mere 2,670 TEUs in 2003, according to the
report. The port already has the capability to send containers stacked double by rail to Mexico City and rail line connections to the U.S. Last year,
the Port of Los Angeles handled 7.2 million TEUs.
Meanwhile, Mexican officials are eyeing Punta Colonet, about 80 miles south of Ensenada, as a major container port. While the plan would take years to
fully develop, requiring significant public and private investment, its construction would have serious implications on the Port of L.A., according to
the report.
The sprawling Baja California beach has the potential to become a major player in maritime trade, with 3,000 acres of backland off the beach and
another 8,000 acres on an adjacent mesa, plus the all-important deep waters able to handle next-generation vessels.
Panama Canal expansion a threat, experts say
By Diane Lindquist
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
August 2, 2007
CHARLIE NEUMAN / Union-Tribune
Some experts say plans to build a megaport at Punta Colonet are threatened by improving the Panama Canal to handle more cargo headed to the East
Coast.
An expansion of the Panama Canal to allow passage for a new generation of megaships may be threatening plans to build a new port at Punta Colonet, 150
miles south of San Diego.
The Mexican and Panamanian projects are envisioned as gateways for an increasing amount of Asian goods bound for the populous East Coast of the United
States. Both would relieve growing congestion at West Coast ports, such as Long Beach and Los Angeles, Seattle and Oakland.
But some experts are saying that Mexico's chance to offer a new trade route has passed.
“The expansion of the Panama Canal almost single-handedly kills Punta Colonet,” Joseph P. Ritzman, project development manager of SSA Marine's
terminal operations in Mexico, told The San Diego Union-Tribune this week at a Long Beach ports conference.
SSA has been considered a possible bidder for a Mexican government concession to develop the Colonet project, at an estimated cost of $9 billion.
Mexican government officials have said they would like to start the bidding process this year for the port and rail line to the U.S.-Mexico border.
What ever happened to the BUY AMERICAN mantra?Baja&Back - 10-15-2007 at 10:12 AM
Quote:
Originally posted by Minnow
What ever happened to the BUY AMERICAN mantra?
Consumers want cheap!toneart - 10-15-2007 at 10:44 AM
This is all part of the NAFTA masterplan. I'm still trying to decide whether it is a good or bad thing. One thing that comes to mind: would you really
want all that shipping traffic stacking up outside L.A. Harbor? Think of navigation hazards, bottleneck delays, increased L.A. freeway traffic,
environmental issues; waste, oilspills, smog, further harm to marine life. What about Security?
I realize that these problems already exist, but they will increase exponentially, in time.
Then there is the rumored (and denied) NAFTA Superhighway. Will this help to alleviate the container shipping traffic after it is loaded onto trucks?
Of course, that is a whole 'nuther issue fraught with problems......and/or solutions. BajaBruno - 10-15-2007 at 10:55 AM
As a barely related observation, perhaps the best way for Columbian/Mexican drug smugglers to get their product into the US unnoticed would be to
containerize it, ship it to China, then turn it around and ship it to the US. No one seems to pay any attention to cargo going west from the Americas
or east from China.cbuzzetti - 10-15-2007 at 03:22 PM
And imagine not having the dockworkers union control the flow of product into the west coast.
As I recall there were some huge delays and ships stacked up outside of Long Beach due to a strike not too long ago.
Might make them more competitive.
One could only hope. IMO
