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The balance of seaborne-cargo delivery in the U.S. shifted further east in the last year, with East Coast seaports making gains against their West Coast counterparts, according to CBRE Group's second-annual North American Seaports and Logistics Index.
According to the index, the Port of Long Beach took the top spot from its Southern California neighbor, the Port of Los Angeles, due mostly to the arrival of a new Asian shipping line in Long Beach. However, most of those on the rise in the top 10 are East and Gulf Coast seaports.
"Companies today are facing monumental supply chain pressures due to changing consumer behavior and a need to balance cost and service while keeping their business safe from interruption," said Adam Mullen, occupier and supply chain leader in CBRE's Industrial & Logistics division, the Americas. "Recent shifts in port volumes as companies strain to determine their best global shipping routes underscore that global commerce is in a race – an arms race of sorts – to build better, even more efficient supply chains."
The renewed momentum for eastern ports can be attributed, in part, to some shippers shifting cargo
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east in response to last year's labor trouble at primary West Coast ports. Cargo traffic at western ports was slowed for months before the longshoreman unions and port management came to a resolution in March 2015.
CBRE said the West Coast labor disruption indirectly contributed to two East Coast ports and one Gulf Coast port climbing in the CBRE rankings, with the Port of New York and New Jersey climbing one spot to No. 2 overall, the Port of Savannah ascending two spots to No. 4 and the Port of Houston leaping five spots to No. 5.
Meanwhile, on the West Coast, the Port of Los Angeles, which posted an atypical slow year, fell two spots to No. 3 in the CBRE index, and the Ports of Seattle and Tacoma fell two spots to No. 6. The Port of Oakland, hindered in the rankings by a mix of factors including a decline in container-shipping volumes and the eventual closure in early 2016 of a terminal, tumbled five spots to No. 10.
West Coast ports accounted for 52 percent of all TEU volume last year in North America, down from 54 percent in 2014 and 57 percent in 2010.
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