Transport Secretary Releases Freight Strategic Plan

By Mark Edward Nero

On Oct. 18, US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx released the draft National Freight Strategic Plan, which offers specific policy proposals and solutions to address the growing challenges of moving freight in America.

The draft plan was unveiled by Foxx in Seattle. He was joined for the announcement by Sen. Maria Cantwell at Seattle Public School Headquarters.

The draft proposes solutions and strategies to address the infrastructure, institutional and financial bottlenecks that hinder the safe and efficient movement of goods, plus identifies successful programs already in place to improve freight planning and investment, and proposes new programs and ideas that could make more progress possible.

“With an increasingly competitive and complex global marketplace and a deteriorating transportation infrastructure that is unfortunately showing the effects of age and underinvestment, the need for us to have a national freight plan could not be more urgent,” Foxx said.

According to the most recent data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, freight shipments last month reached an all-time high and 30.4 percent higher than the low in April 2009 during the recession. Concerns remain within the US government that the country’s infrastructure can’t accommodate continued growth: In the next 30 years America’s population is expected to grow by 70 million people, while freight traffic is expected to increase by 42 percent by 2040.

Specific strategies include:

• Ensuring dedicated freight funding. The draft plan emphasizes the importance of a dedicated freight program to improve the movement of freight and meet regional economic demand. It would also require or incentivize State Freight Advisory Committees, State Freight Plans, and cross-jurisdictional/cooperative planning.

• Identification of major trade gateways and multimodal national freight networks/corridors. The Dept. of Transportation is releasing a draft Multimodal Freight Network map to inform planners, private sector stakeholders, and the public about where major freight flows occur and where special attention to freight issues may be most warranted.

• Continuing to support local, state, and interagency collaboration, including close cooperation with port authorities, private sector stakeholders, and agencies in Canada and Mexico; sharing best practices for freight planning; supporting advisory committees and public forums with stakeholders; and encouraging effective use of funding available at the national level.

Other strategies outlined include: development and deployment of newer and more advanced freight data resources; improvement of safety and support of the adoption of new transportation technologies; and development of the next generation freight transportation workforce.

“Congestion on rails, surface streets, and at our ports across the Pacific Northwest costs businesses billions of dollars a year and gives an edge to competitors around the globe. The National Freight Strategic Plan means places like Seattle and Tacoma will be part of our national strategy to quickly move products through traffic congested areas,” Cantwell said. More information about the draft plan is available at www.transportation.gov/freight.

Bipartisan Icebreaker Construction Bill Introduced

By Mark Edward Nero

Two US senators said on May 19 that they’ve introduced legislation that would authorize the US Navy to build up to six icebreakers for use by the Coast Guard.

Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. and Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska authored the bill, known as the Icebreaker Recapitalization Act.

Under the legislation, the Coast Guard and Secretary of the Navy would, no later than six months after passage of the bill, be required to establish a process for the design and construction of the icebreakers, for use by the USCG.

The Coast Guard is the sole service responsible for icebreaking missions.

“Our legislation makes sure that the United States is able to protect our interests in the Arctic, and it gives the men and women in the Coast Guard and Navy the tools they need to do their jobs,” Cantwell said in a statement.

“From a military perspective, this is an imperative,” Murkowski said. “From an economic development viewpoint, it is a down-payment on an Arctic future. And as a scientific research opportunity, it opens up a new world of knowledge.”

Currently, the Coast Guard only has two operational icebreakers: Polar Star, a recently retrofitted heavy-duty vessel; and Healy, a medium-duty research vessel. A second heavy-duty icebreaker, the Polar Sea, is currently being considered for the scrap heap.

According to the Coast Guard High Latitude Study released to Congress in 2011, the United States needs six heavy duty and four medium icebreakers to meet the statutory and mission requirements of the Coast Guard and the Navy.

Any new icebreakers are estimated to cost over $1 billion each to build. Under the Cantwell-Murkowski bill, Congress would have to include funds in future spending bills to pay for the vessels.

Environmentally Friendly Longliner Launched

The environmentally friendly longliner Northern Leader was launched Jan. 26 by JM Martinac Shipbuilding Corp. The 184-foot freezer longliner – the largest fishing vessel currently under construction in the United States -- launched at 5:30 AM from Martinac’s Tacoma shipyard.

The vessel, designed by Seattle-based Jensen Maritime Consultants and owned by fishing company Alaskan Leader Fisheries, will be homeported in Kodiak, Alaska.

The Northern Leader, which is designed to hold more than 1,000 tons of cod fish, is operated by 31 people and can deploy a long line over 45 miles.

The vessel will be used to support the longline fisheries of the North Pacific, Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands. It’s powered with five Caterpillar generators supplying two 1,000 kW Schottel Z drive electric motors. The hold is refrigerated with 3, 150-HP compressors reducing the temperature down as low as -25 degrees Fahrenheit.

The vessel is ABS classed for the Maltese Cross, A1 Fishing Vessel with AMS. Total international tonnage is estimated at 1,800 ITC.

“The launch of the Northern Leader is another proud step in the 89-year history of Martinac building ships and creating jobs in the Puget Sound,” US Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) said. “I was proud to write and spearhead the passage of Congressional legislation in 2010 that supported the construction of the Northern Leader. We look forward to building more state-of-the-art fishing vessels right here in Washington State and supporting the growth of our maritime economy.”

Cantwell wrote legislation signed into law in December 2010 that created a cooperative for the freezer longline fishery. The cooperative eliminates the race for fish and enables companies to harvest more value from each catch, helping to increase profit by 20 percent and spur investment in new fishing vessels with greater processing and storage capacity.

Washington Senator Talks National Freight Strategy, Port Funding

During a visit to the Washington State Port of Vancouver on Tuesday, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) said that in order to meet President Barack Obama's call to double United States exports within five years, multimodal freight transportation must become a national priority. To this end, she announced plans to push fellow federal lawmakers for the creation of a national freight strategy that includes significant funding for port infrastructure projects.

One project specifically mentioned by Cantwell was the Vancouver port's $140 million West Vancouver Freight Access project, which the port currently requires $50 million to $70 million to complete. Port officials said that if Cantwell succeeds in her national freight strategy plan, they will immediately request $25 million for the freight project.

The port had hoped to tap into President Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act stimulus funding to move the project forward, but ultimately garnered $2.5 million for the project from the nearly $800 billion allocated nationwide.

Cantwell said she had not yet determined how much infrastructure money she would ask to be made available through such a national freight strategy plan.