California Terminal Fee Incentive to End Next Month

Terminal operators at the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports this week said its traffic mitigation fee will return to normal levels Feb. 1 after proving ineffective. The adjusted fee was originally announced In November by the West Coast Marine Terminal Operator Agreement to help incentivize the movement of containers during off-peak hours (see 2111120022). The fee, in place from Dec. 1 through Jan. 31, was intended to “create a financial incentive” to move containers during off-peak hours by only charging the fee during peak hours,” the WCMTOA said in a Jan. 18 news release.

But since the fee was implemented in December, the group said “the proportion of gate activity during the day shift versus the night shift did not change from where it has been averaging since 2018.” Starting Feb. 1, the fee will revert to $34.21 per twenty-foot equivalent unit or $68.42 for all “other sizes of container for non-exempt international container moves through the terminals at the ports, and will again be payable throughout all hours of terminal operation.”