For our transportation system to move twice as much cargo efficiently between now and 2020 will require larger and more efficient port facilities, better highway access to our ports and dedicated truck and rail corridors to get this cargo off city streets. West Coast ports are stressed, trying to accommodate growing volumes of imports.
Port land is a scarce resource, and productivity improvements are hampered by parochial protection.
East Coast ports struggle to deepen their channels and berths as cargo patterns and ship sizes change. The entire system is faced with a complex set of issues that must be accommodated. A very low-cost part of the solution is to use information more efficiently. The information flow in our MTS is haphazard, at best. It has yet to be engineered with the underlying customer in mind.