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New Port of Los Angeles rail yard expected to reduce air pollution, traffic
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A container is off loaded from a ship at the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro, California on May 12, 2010.
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The Port of Los Angeles said it finished 2012 with a 1.7 percent increase in cargo volumes over the year before. Port officials are also expected to break ground Wednesday on a new rail yard project in Wilmington.
The new Berth 200 Rail Yard and Roadway Project is expected to streamline the movement of container cargo from docked ships to trains and trucks. The Port said when the $137 million project is completed in summer 2014, it will eliminate more than 2,000 daily truck trips on the 710 and 110 freeways, reducing traffic and pollution. The construction is expected to create about 2,000 jobs.
The Port said the increase in cargo volumes from 2011 to 2012 came despite a soft month of December, during which imports fell 6.7 percent and exports declined 16.4 percent compared to December of 2011.
The Port measures cargo volumes by tracking the total number of 20-foot equivalent (TEU) containers that move through. In 2012, that number was 8,077,714 compared to 7,940,510 TEUs in 2011. Officials said last year is the third time in the Port’s history that it topped 8 million TEU. The last time was in 2007.
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Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that the project had already broken ground Tuesday.
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