SoCal Ports Propose Ban on Old Trucks

By Andrea Fischer and Dan Leone, Staff Reporters
This story appears in the April 23 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach said they would ban the oldest drayage trucks from doing business at their terminals in a move that also would bar port truckers from working as independent owner-operators at the nation’s two busiest harbors.
Environmentalists and labor groups praised the plan, which was announced April 13, but intermodal shippers and trucking industry representatives said they may file lawsuits challenging the program, which they said could threaten business at the ports and put small drayage companies and independent owner-operators out of business.
“It’s a major . . . monumental effort,” said Art Wong, spokesman for the Port of Los Angeles. “Beginning next year, we want to start a replacement/retrofit program for trucks at the ports. Under the current proposal, only those trucking companies we’ve licensed would be able to move cargo.
“At some point under the current proposal, drivers would transition from owner-operators to trucking company employees,” Wong said.
He said the two ports will present a final truck plan to the harbor commissions of both Los Angeles and Long Beach for approval “in July.”
But Curtis Whalen, executive director of American Trucking Associations’ Intermodal Motor Carriers Conference, said the ports are “coming out with a plan that in essence won’t allow owner-operators to work in the ports anymore regardless of whether or not they have a clean truck.”
“We don’t think the focus of this plan is on clean air and we have a law firm examining these new details the port has released, which we believe are illegal,” Whalen said.
Wong said the ports “have looked at our authority to set tariffs on how our facilities are used and operated — and we believe that authority would withstand legal challenges.”
Spokesmen for both ports said they were working with “industry stakeholders” including trucking officials, intermodal shippers and environmental groups to finalize the plan to require “drayage truck owners to scrap and replace the oldest of about 16,000 trucks working at the ports.”
The port commissions last year approved the San Pedro Bay Clean Air Action Plan to reduce emissions from trucks, railways, ocean carriers and shippers. The ports must prove they are reducing emissions before they are able to expand their infrastructure (11-27, p. 29).
The draft program to limit truck emissions, published by the two ports April 13, falls under the San Pedro Bay plan.
“Drayage truck owners will scrap and replace the oldest of approximately 16,000 trucks working in the ports, and retrofit the others” beginning next year, the ports said.
To enter the ports, the drivers of those trucks — mostly independent owner-operators — would have to work for motor carrier companies that would bid on port concession contracts containing strict environmental and workplace requirements, the ports said in the proposed plan.
“Beginning in 2008, the ports will use their tariff authority to only allow concessionaires operating clean trucks to enter port terminals . . .” the ports said. “The concession trucking companies will be required to meet the ports’ Clean Air Action Plan standard, defined as EPA-standard 2007 or newer trucks” or “retrofitted trucks manufactured in 1994 or newer.”
The ports said trucks older than model-years 1989 through 1993 will be barred from the ports year by year.
Initially, unretrofitted trucks would be allowed to call on the ports during the proposed program’s five-year “transition period,” but would be required to pay a per-trip “truck impact fee” of $34 to $54, according to the proposed plan.
Allison O’Donnell, director of government relations for the National Retail Federation, said the proposed plan “is of huge concern to us because retailers are some of the biggest shippers and really rely on ports for transportation.”
The costs of the program “would be borne ultimately by the shipper, and the impact to our industry could be significant,” she said. “This is something that could be challenged in court.”
Nevertheless, Adrian Martinez, air-quality attorney for the National Resources Defense Council, said the ports’ plan “is legally sound” and would provide much needed oversight of drayage trucking operations at the ports.
“Right now, there is no direct connection between the ports and the truckers, and this really creates that connection,” said Martinez. “One of the big problems [for the ports] is a lack of accountability for truck emissions. This shifts that responsibility for clean trucks from the trucker to the motor carrier company.”
But IMCC’s Whalen said the proposed plan could put some trucking companies out of business. “There appear to be fewer motor carriers who will qualify [to move port freight] under the plan,” as compared with the number of companies operating in the ports, Whalen said.
Trucks currently make about 30,000 trips a day in and out of the two ports, hauling more than 40% of all goods imported to the United States, said Theresa Adams Lopez, director of media relations for the Port of Los Angeles.
The ports said they planned to spend up to $1.8 billion to subsidize the purchase of new and retrofitted trucks, and would fund the program primarily with revenue collected from the “truck impact fees” paid by older, unretrofitted trucks.
Other funding sources identified by the proposed plan include state bond and taxpayer money.