12/27/12
MY WORD
Mr. Bressman’s loyalty to his livelihood and his harbor is to be commended and admired (“We can’t afford to just sit on our harbor,” Times-Standard, Dec. 22, Page A4).
However it is my opinion that the adage “build it and they will come” is excellent fodder for a movie script but very thin forage anywhere else. There is absolutely no argument with the fact that Humboldt Bay forms an excellent, if somewhat limited in draft-depth, harbor. But the same can be said about several hundred other sites around the world; say, for example, Kwajalein Atoll. An excellent, fully enclosed harbor, ideal for anchoring vessels, but no one would consider building a port there.
A successful port requires many things, including a source of outgoing cargo, a market for incoming cargo, a transportation net to move cargo to or from elsewhere and the ability to compete economically with other ports in the same country, as well as modern cargo handling facilities. Other things are helpful, such as existing vessel supply facilities (ship chandlers), shipyards capable of emergency repair work on large vessels, recreation and service facilities for onshore crew leave. With the exception of an adequate, trained and willing work force, Humboldt Bay can boast of none of these, nor any hope of any of them soon.
It is more than time to face a few facts. There is no rail connection from here to anywhere, nor is there any sign of repair to that ruined utility any time in the near or distant future. The railroad served one, and only one commodity, redwood.
That commodity is now long gone, and in view of the many cries for preservation from the tree-huggers, probably never to return. Truck transportation is now adequate to serve the present needs of the immediate area, but expanding it to the extent needed by a modern port facility would overwhelm the present network with no signs of any real improvements, such as the much debated but nonactive widening of 101 through Richardson Grove.
The direct route inland — truck or rail — to the East through the mountains is a silly pipe dream involving a vast amount of engineering marvels such as large bridges, many switchbacks and tunnels of huge size in order to accommodate trainloads of containers stacked two-high. Such an enterprise faces an expense of many billions of dollars and is certainly not feasible in the face of the present harbor situation.
The Longshore labor agreement negotiations of the early ’60s in San Francisco spent many, many hours and days struggling with the problems occasioned by the newly agreed 8-hour guarantee, as opposed to the traditional 4-hour callout. After one year under the new guarantee, one port on the coast boasting only a tiny fraction of the entire work force — Eureka — consumed a huge proportion of the negotiators’ time because of the death of the redwood trade. Special travel rates, meal allowances and board payments had to be worked out so as to provide work opportunities in other ports for the Eureka workforce.
They still exist today for the same reason, and many, many experts were consulted on the future of that port at the time.
I know, because I was there as one of the employer negotiators. I have spent 33 years as an employee of the Pacific Maritime Association, the last 25 as Southern California Area Manager, responsible for the payment of wages, training, safety programs and day-to-day industrial relations for the four ports of San Diego, Los Angeles, Long Beach and Port Hueneme.
John D. MacEvoy resides in Cutten.
