Call to ports: remain open 24 hours.

Hong Kong's port operates 24 hours. So does Singapore's.

So with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's recent rejection of a major expansion of the traffic-choked Long Beach (710) Freeway, attention has turned to the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, which have yet to extend operations around the clock.

It's not that the importers and terminal operators are happy with the traffic logjams, any more than are port truckers who create the mess by hauling cargo in and out of the port complex during daylight hours.

But no one is taking the first step.

The terminals claim they are prepared to begin all night operations -- but only if the importers generate enough business for them during off-peak hours, which thus far has not happened.

Importers don't want to shift their distribution warehouses to 24-hour schedules unless there are enough after-hours shipments to warrant the cost.

"The whole system has to go to 24 hours for us to go 24 hours," said Tony Minyon, national logistics manager for Torrance-based Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc., which runs a daytime auto parts distribution center in Ontario. Otherwise, he said, cargo "is not going to get to its destination any faster. There's no benefit to us."

Bankers' hours 

Terminals remain open throughout the night but only to load and unload cargo coming off container ships, which arrive and depart at all hours. Goods are stacked in a yard until they can be moved the following day.

Typical hours of operation for terminal gates are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., with some port facilities remaining open for the second shift, 6 p.m. to 2 a.m., three or four nights per week.

That's a far cry from the ports of Hong Kong and Singapore, which despite being far smaller are No. 1 and No. 2 in the world, respectively, for container traffic. (The L.A.-Long Beach complex is No. 3 in the world, with $200 billion of cargo moving through annually.)

Traffic congestion is the price the region has been paying so that importers and steamship companies can avoid nighttime surcharges to workers who already make far more than their counterparts in Asia.

The 710 freeway currently handles 35,000 trucks per day, with a projected increase to 91,000 trucks daily by 2020. Those patterns would be altered dramatically if the ports went 24 hours, although there have been no recent studies on the specific impact.

Much of the cargo coming into local ports ends up at hundreds of warehouse and distribution centers that importers operate in the Inland Empire. Their reluctance to extend those centers' hours beyond the 8 a.m.-to-5 p.m. shift is considered the biggest stumbling block to longer terminal gate hours.

Importers say that rail yards east of downtown Los Angeles don't have coordinated train departures to points east with shipments arriving from their Inland Empire warehouses. So it wouldn't be cost-efficient, they argue, to give employees nighttime pay to redistribute cargo that won't move out of the region until the following day anyway.

Some larger importers, such as Kmart Corp., Target Corp. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., run all-night distribution centers. But they can afford to because they take as many as 2,000 40-foot containers per week.

Small- and medium-sized import companies, which order one or two to 50 containers per week and account for 70 percent of port traffic, believe it is not cost efficient to keep their centers open after daylight hours.

Truckers wait

Like terminal operators, truckers are reliant on importers to move to 24-hour schedules. Even if terminals extended their gate hours, truckers would be unwilling to keep a load worth between $50,000 and $1 million parked on a street overnight until a distribution center opened.

Few trucking companies would resist a broadly implemented 'round-the-clock schedule. Truckers are paid per load and not by the hour, so they would be able to make more trips per shift during non-peak hours when the roads had little commuter traffic. As it stands, truckers often must wait two hours or more just to get inside the terminal gates in the morning.

Longshoremen are another port group that would welcome longer hours.

International Longshore and Warehouse Union members, for instance, make $27.68 per hour in base pay during the regular shift, $36.91 per hour during the evening shift and $44.29 per hour for the "hoot" shift, which runs from 3 a.m. to 8 a.m. The cost of labor in Singapore is about one-fifth that amount, by comparison.

"Certainly some (importers) are trying to avoid the cost of longshore labor," said Steve Stallone, the ILWU's spokesman. "They've always been blaming the union for the traffic problem rather than dealing with the fact that they've got to do something about it."

Longer hours at the ports would likely result in further increases to shipment prices. Steamship lines recently increased the price charged to haul an import container from Asia by about $700, to between $1,900 and $2,200 each.

Additionally, importers have to foot the bill for labor, security and other overhead costs at their warehouse and distribution centers.

"We're encouraging everybody to stay open 24 hours a day," said Al Fierstein, director of business development at the L.A. Port. "But it becomes an economic issue. Everything's driven by the importers. It's their cargo."

Renewed effort

Since the freeway expansion plan was dropped in May, transportation officials joined the push for a 24-hour port complex, something local governments and community groups and the ports themselves have been discussing.

The MTA wants to complete a $4 million study this October that will examine incentives for trucking cargo during off-peak hours. One option would be to charge fees for daytime movement.

The study will also recommend an expansion plan that would have less impact on surrounding communities.

Meanwhile, port officials want to implement a six-week pilot program that involves all terminals adding 12 hours to their daily operations to show importers its benefits.

But even on a trial basis, terminals won't budge until they know how much additional cargo would be moved during the night.

"We were hoping it would be in place by the summer," said Wilma Powell, director of trade and maritime services at the Long Beach port. "But we don't see enough commitment from importers and the smaller warehouse people to initiate the program."

RELATED ARTICLE: Late Freight Movement

L.A. ports have limited hours compared with other cargo hubs such as Hong Kong (above).

Port of Los Angeles: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. container terminal operations with night shifts three or four days per week at some facilities

Port of Long Beach: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. container terminal operations with night shifts three or four days per week at some facilities

Los Angeles International Airport: 24-hour air cargo operation

Port of New York and New Jersey: 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. container terminal operations with one facility open until midnight

Port of Hong Kong: 24-hour container terminal operations

Port of Singapore: 24-hour container terminal operations

FedEx Express: 24-hour express air cargo and mail delivery operation at Ontario distribution center

United Parcel Service Inc.: 24-hour express air package delivery operation at Ontario distribution hub