New Yorker Opinion- June 2009 issue

The maritime industry, always reticent about speaking up (even when things are going well) has fallen between many cracks. And, in a sense, its invisibility (a tribute to its success because trade moves without incident) makes it harder when it’s time to get funded, at all levels of government. It suffers, along with the rest of an ailing US infrastructure.

The previous Administration in Washington, DC (whatever epithets one might wish to hurl at them) did have the prescience to organise an expert commission that took a view, out to year 2030 and beyond, of how to fund surface transportation. In reading the voluminous reports and experts’ input, ports are treated as a spur of the land-based network, somewhat removed from the locus of the important infrastructure funding conversations.

The time has now come for one idea generated by the commission: a Federal Freight Fee (FFF) feeding a Federal Freight Trust Fund (FTF). A new group emerging in the Washington, DC – the Coalition for America’s Gateways and Trade Corridors (CAGTC) – is spearheading a campaign to put the FTF and FFF in front of Congress this year. Not surprisingly, its membership includes more than a dozen ports (including the biggest in the US) and regional organisations with a maritime focus.

Every port in the country should be signing up to join the CAGTC, which describes “…a national vision and investment strategy…” for shaping and guiding a national infrastructure, with coordination at different levels of government. The CAGTC is also advocating the re-establishment of an office of intermodal freight within the US Department of Transportation. Ports could benefit from such vision, instead of continuing to suffer because they are at the mercy of policy actions crossing multiple jurisdictions, funds sources, and lengthy periods of time. The CAGTC also advocates an active role for private sector players, who will be integral in funding going forward.