PierPass, SoCal ports launch program aimed at reducing terminal delays

PierPass, in conjunction with the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, announced an initiative this week to study and address issues that cause “trouble tickets” during pickup and delivery at port terminals. 

Nearly 1500 trucks (roughly 5 percent of all trucks) per day cause “substantial delays” by either showing up with a container for export without a proper booking number or show up to a terminal for a container that’s not there. 

Bruce Wargo, president of PierPass, says his company plans to identify which carriers or drivers regularly have trouble tickets and try to educate them on how to use the available resources — web, phone, etc. — to ensure before a driver arrives either for delivery or receipt that the booking number is right or that the load has arrived. 

“We’re going to continue to monitor these problems with these terminals and coming back in 6 or 7 months to the trade that says these problems are persisting and can be avoided or fixed with some simple steps by the stakeholders,” Wargo said during a teleconference Wednesday, adding that the delays are a “substantial issue that needs to be addressed as cargo problems grow.” 

Wargo says that each trouble ticket adds roughly an hour of time to that specific driver’s time at the terminal and that it delays terminal workers and other trucks at the ports.