In these days of hyper-connected supply chains, we sometimes forget about the human factor, good old fashioned labour on the docks, in the warehouses, and around the port.
    For Americans, a port strike in southern France (with its ameliorative impact on aframax tanker rates) seems very far away. But a labour stoppage in my backyard, the Port of New York & New Jersey, is more worrisome, especially since labour militancy (for lack of a better word) seems to have shifted westward, to Pacific ports, in recent years.
    Analysts looking at the late September work stoppage at New York, have pointed to an upcoming contract renewal. The new leadership is steering the big International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) at a time when workers feel that they may see newfound sympathy from Washington, DC policy-makers if they got into a tussle. Ouch. 
    Trade movements are very fragile; New York has benefited, ironically, from the nervousness of logistics managers seeking to diversify away from imports moving entirely through the Pacific. Almost every month, the shipping press reports on a new terminal or service architected around bigger ships coming to the Gulf Coast, or the East Coast, as the widened Panama Canal comes online.
    One example, of many, is CSX railroad’s Liberty Corridor, a newly completed initiative in the Port of New York. After blasting away and raising the clearances on two ancient rail tunnels, the port’s docks (actually on the New Jersey side of the harbour) are now linked to the Midwest, with a double stack container service.
Yet, the West Coast is not going down without a fight. Prince Rupert, a deepwater port several days closer to China than alternatives, has CN Rail service literally right at the dock - without any landside infrastructure clutter.
    Here is a reminder to East Coast labour honchos who might slow things down and force Christmas products to sit at anchor and idling double stack trains. In the late 1990s, CN hooked up with the Illinois Central. New York (or Norfolk, for that matter) does not have a monopoly on service to the Midwest. And, by the way, no big infrastructure projects (with dynamite to raise the roof on 150 year old rail tunnels) are needed to let those western boxes flow from British Columbia.

Source: Port Strategy