thoughtleaders KURT J. NAGLE
expect to be in the stores when they
go shopping, to the parts and components manufacturers rely on, and
to farmers’ being able to ship their
grain overseas. We need all of that to
work efficiently in order to compete, especially with the president’s
call for doubling U.S. exports in the
next five years.
Another thing we’re stressing is
that transportation infrastructure
investment and projects provide not
only short-term economic benefits
and jobs, but also long-term benefits that can improve the entire system’s performance and help our
nation in terms of economic efficiency and competitiveness. There
are also environmental benefits,
because infrastructure investment
can help to reduce congestion and
airborne emissions. We think there
needs to be a greater emphasis on
freight transportation than there
has been historically.
QThe Panama Canalexpansion is expected to change shipping and trade patterns. Meanwhile,
the container shipping business has
been very volatile. How are ports
responding to such uncertainty—
especially when these factors are
beyond their control?
AEconomic conditions have had a significant impact on global
trade, and obviously that has had an
impact on ports’ revenues and
resources. Many of our members
have had to undergo fairly significant belt tightening and look at
reducing costs everywhere possible.
But they still have to think about
where to put their resources to
manage through this. In many
cases, ports are continuing to move
forward with projects that will be
needed when trade and commerce
pick up again. These are long-term
infrastructure projects that ports
were building not for five years but
O
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for 30, 40, or 50 years down the road.
One of the things ports have become
good at is strategic management—“
adaptive management in uncertain times,” as
AAPA’s former chairperson Geraldine
Knatz called it. Ports are continually adapting their management strategies as situations change and evolve. Our members are
looking at the Panama Canal expansion
and other factors in international trade to
determine what they mean for individual
ports, as well as how to prepare themselves
and adapt successfully to the new environment, whatever their role might be—
whether as major load centers, feeder ports,
or facilities for handling specialized or
niche cargoes.
QExporters and importers—the ports’ ultimate customers—say their top
concerns are service quality, responsiveness, and efficiency. How can ports, which
have limited flexibility because of their
fixed infrastructure, ensure that they meet
those needs?
APorts are doing everything they can to make their own operations and the
things they have direct control over as efficient, responsive, and flexible as possible to
ensure the ultimate customer’s needs are
met. But this issue gets into the less clear or
less direct role of public port authorities. A
lot goes on at ports involving participants
in the logistics chain that public port
authorities don’t have direct control over,
such as terminal operators if the port is a
landlord, tugs, pilots, the Coast Guard,
Customs, security, labor, the Army Corps of
Engineers, and private railroads and trucking companies. Public port agencies can
serve as a vehicle to help coordinate, collaborate, partner, and facilitate the broad
range of interests in and around the port.
This is critical to achieving efficiency and
supporting the customer.
Ports are, to a larger extent than in the
past, looking to take on leadership roles
that extend far beyond the terminal gates to
whatever impacts them and their customers. That includes transportation policy
affecting landside and waterside issues that
are not in their direct control. The port
authority is playing an increasingly vital,
expanded role that is not limited to the
confines of its facilities. ;
