SoCal ports truck plan moves forward, lawsuit imminent

The Southern California ports?$2.4 billion truck re-regulation plan continued to make incremental steps forward last week, while behind the scenes, industry attorneys are putting the final touches on a legal challenge that could determine whether the ports are able to enforce the plan.

The ports seek to enact local regulations that would lead to the replacement or retrofit of nearly 17,000 diesel trucks with newer less emissive models within five years. A $35-per-TEU container tax, already implemented by the two ports, will be used to raise cash to pay for the plan and to help provide matching funds to obtain further state bond money.

Last week, officials at the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles officially choose a half-dozen truck manufacturers and retailers as qualifying to receive truck orders from the ports truck program. The ports identified truck maker-retailers International, LA Freightliner, Mack and Volvo as suppliers of 2007 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency-compliant trucks.

Two additional manufacturers, Inland Kenworth and Sterling Trucks, were chosen by the ports to provide liquefied natural gas trucks to meet quotas for alternative fuel vehicles under the plan.

While environmental groups claim that LNG tractors produce less greenhouse gases than diesel trucks, government, academic and industry studies disagree, showing that 2007 model-year diesel trucks are less emissive across the board. Despite these studies, the ports want to see as much as half of the drayage fleet running on LNG within five years.

Each of the four diesel truck vendors had two models approved for purchase under the plan, a day cab and an extended cab models. Port officials approved only a single day cab model from the two LNG truck makers.

While the ports are moving forward toward their self-determined Oct. 1 deadline to start the program, attorneys for the American Trucking Association continue to finalize a promised lawsuit over the two ports truck plan. The ATA has been saying for more than a year that they planned to sue if the ports did not eliminate certain portions of the truck plan that allegedly violate federal interstate commerce regulations.

Additional inner workings of the ports plan were also announced last week, including the firm that will be overseeing the plan for the Port of Los Angeles. Los Angeles port commissioners last week signed off on more than $2.5 million in operational and support contracts connected to the truck plan. The commission approved an $864,000 contract with Quietco Environmental Services to manage the program for the port and more than $1.3 million to two firms for program outreach to businesses and residents near the port.

Los Angeles port officials also approved a $500,000 contract extension for the Boston Consulting Group to continue monitoring the economic impacts of the truck plan. The BCG had been under contract with the port since February when port officials awarded the firm a $150,000 contract to develop and economic impact study of aspects of the plan unique to the Los Angeles port.

Both ports also agreed to an initial purchase of 500 trucks -- 400 diesel trucks and 100 LNG trucks -- approving $53.2 million to pay for them. Under the truck plan, nearly 3,000 pre-1989 model year trucks serving the two ports will be barred from entering any port facility as of Oct. 1. The ports, in making their recent approvals, did not offer an explanation of where the several thousand additional trucks will be purchased from or who will pay for them. 

Source: American Shipper