The records continue to mount at the San Pedro Bay Port Complex.
In October, dockworkers at the Port of Los Angeles handled 905,026 containers – a record for the month and also representing the first four-month streak of exceeding 900,000 containers. Meanwhile, the Port of Long Beach set its all-time record in October, with workers handling 987,191 containers that month.
On the year, the two ports have handled nearly 16.4 million containers in 10 months – about 252,000 containers shy of the 2023 total.
“These robust, sustained volumes will likely continue in the coming months with strong consumer spending, an early Lunar New Year, importer concerns about unresolved East Coast labor issues and the possibility of new tariffs next year that could drive up shipping costs,” Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of L.A., said in a statement.
Broken down, the Port of L.A.’s totals included 462,740 loaded import containers and 122,716 loaded exports. The Port of Long Beach had 487,563 loaded imports and 112,845 loaded exports. (The remainder constituted empty containers in either direction.)
The soaring container movement largely follows this year’s trend of improvement from last year, when contentious labor negotiations affected where shipping lines sent their ships and cargo. While these two ports have historically represented the bulk of trans-Pacific trade for the U.S., several factors have helped magnify that role.
For one, the same labor issues that the West Coast ports experienced last year are now largely mirrored on the East and Gulf coast ports. There remain issues traversing the waters in the Panama Canal and the Red Sea. And Chinese manufacturers are seen as eager to get in ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s promised tariffs against the geopolitical rival.
Dockworkers prevent backlog
Port leaders also tipped their hats to the dockworkers, who loaded and unloaded cargo vessels essentially without any meaningful backlog forming.
“We appreciate the hard work of our waterfront workforce and terminal operators as they continue to move cargo at a record-setting pace by moving nearly 1 million (containers) without congestion or backlogs,” Port of Long Beach Chief Executive Mario Cordero said in a statement. “We anticipate a continued influx of cargo due to robust consumer demand, concerns about potential tariffs and ongoing labor negotiations at ports on the East and Gulf coasts.”
Added Seroka: “I’m grateful to our dockworkers, truckers, terminal operators and others who handle these record levels of cargo every day. They have done it with speed,
efficiency and without a single ship backed up at sea.”
Wait times
Container dwell times – that is, the time period in which offloaded containers wait until being loaded onto drayage trucks or rail cars – remained essentially flat even with the month’s volume increases. Containers on average waited 3.16 days at terminals before being loaded onto trucks, while rail-bound cargo waited 9.86 days.
“The continued upward trajectory in dwell times through October underscores both the complexity and adaptability of our supply chain as we manage increased cargo volumes and try to balance intermodal equipment availability with demand,” said Natasha Villa, external affairs manager of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, in a statement. “Our marine terminals continue to work diligently to balance capacity and maintain fluidity, providing supply chain system resilience, and ensuring that the nation’s goods keep moving.”
