[CDB]

The only immediate solution is to route container ships to non-California ports. The ports in Oregon and Washington state combined do not have the capacity of CA but they also do not have the shipping restrictions.

Agreed. Why have the Ports of Seattle and Tacoma NOT seized the opportunities abandoned by California ports?

[Vigilanteman]

As a guy who used to route shipping for two different companies, I can tell you that the Longshoreman's Union strike in 2002 convinced me to move to Seattle-Tacoma over the objections of our parent company in Japan.

They loved Los Angeles-Long Beach because there were a choice of vessels leaving port daily. Those that called at Seattle-Tacoma might be as few as three per week. With much haggling, I convinced them that the three extra days (at most) to use Seattle-Tacoma was nothing to overcome the congestions and strike-risk in LA-Long Beach.

Things went smoothly for a few years thereafter until other small shippers (like us) begin to make the switch. We would sometimes loose up to another week in Chicago as the big importers would overwhelm the need for rail transportation from Chicago to the final container yard (just outside of Pittsburgh, in our case).

So, we moved on to phase 3-- pay a little more for ocean shipping through the Panama Canal and unload in east coast ports only a day or two by rail to the final container yard. The little extra in ocean shipping charge was largely offset by the reduction in overland transportation charges. But best of all, we didn't have to deal with congestion issues either at the port or the railyard. IOW, we paid just a little extra for dependable delivery.

This might not be an option for whole trainload importers like Wal-Mart, but it was a definite option of 3-4 containers per month importers like the companies for which I managed shipments.