As reported in the Daily Journal of Commerce, a new study from the Port of Portland predicts that freight volumes will double in 30 years.
Just to keep things in perspective, Metro’s projections show that even with increased truck freight, trucks will still be a single-digit percentage of vehicles on the road.
Let’s not take our eyes off of the main chance: single-occupancy vehicles.
30 responses to “Freight to Double in 30 Years”
If the current 30-years Transportation Plans for the Portland region stay effect we may not have to worry about freight activity and population growth.
With the current estimated volumes of vehicles in the critical I-5 corridor, we now know that we could be expecting 14-hours of backups of covering 6-miles in length. That is planned congestion when you have these facts and do nothing to correct or eliminate the problems.
However what I learned at this PSU Traffic and Transportation Class is that when congestion gets this bad it just gets to a natural saturation point and then it levels out and people and businesses just moves on. It is as if there is only so much that the people and business that rely on freight movement can subject themselves too and then they make their own determination that they have had enough. At that point they start making other plans and move on.
So the good news is that it is not going to be as bad as some think. Because when companies cannot move their freight and businesses cannot achieve just-in-time delivery many just close shop and move on. Current estimates are that this represents apparoximately 200,000 employees and their jobs
From what I can see in review of current plans is that the currently leadership and planners have made up their minds and that they do not want these 200,000 jobs that will be lost and with them all of the families that go with the jobs.
So do not worry, there will be less people and jobs and our region will not grow the way we think, or they may have just out smarted us and they just do not want our current freight dependent economy to exist and they have better plans for us all.
God loves Social Engineers and Transportation Planners!
With the current estimated volumes of vehicles in the critical I-5 corridor, we now know that we could be expecting 14-hours of backups of covering 6-miles in length.
Not that anyone should take those estimates seriously. Who are those people who are going to spend 14 hours in traffic to get to work? It seems to me that we ought to be evaluating realistic scenarios for the consequences of choices we might make, not fear-mongering about scenarios we all know will be avoided.
Ross W.
Yes, the City of Portland’s own commission appointed to look at the I-5/I-405 problems came up with that reported estimate of how serious the congestion problems are estimated to get with 14-hours congestion that resulted in 6-miles of backups. So call Sam Adams office and tell him that his appointees should not take these numbers and facts, public.
We should also tell the freight committee to not talk to press and let the public know that we have some real transportation and congestion problems that can result in the loss of 200,000 jobs if freight mobility comes to a dead stop in the 2030 time frame.
The Freight Committees are only suggesting that that they see a need to double our current ability to handle freight. It is not just our roads and highways, its heavy rail, and with a maritime connection both local and internationally.
I would like to know from others that may have these facts what percentage of the containers that come throught our Ports off load to rail and to trucks. What is the physical count of trucks going into and out of our big terminals everyday on average. I think it is a big deal. I would also like to know how many of these trucks get out and on to the I-5 corridor or came from the I-5 corridor.
To paraphrase Charlie Hales, I can’t get too excited about “freight movement crisis” in Portland when I see log trucks breezing thru town in the middle of the day. I would expect that some people now living in Clark county will be moving back to Portland long before I-5 congestion approaches predicted. These predictions remind me of the 20 nuclear power plants the “experts” said we would need in the 70’s…we need to shift to the energy industry perspective, i.e. reduce and/or manage demand before we blow lots of dough on capacity.
Freight operations that want to stay and serve this market…I don’t think UPS, Fed Ex, etc. will be leaving…will have to innovate. UPS built a hub in Vancouver, so the Brown fleet for Clark county does not have to deal with I-5. Look for more fuel efficient vehicles, more rail, no more left turns, etc.
Traded sector industry…manufacturing and otherwise are much more at risk due to workforce issues…health care costs and lack of skilled engineers and operators (CasGen gets welders from S. America!) Intel did not lose marketshare due to travel times to PDX.
But if moving freight is really something that threatens our economic well being, there is an easy fix…reduce SOVs by investing in real transportation options.
Paul –
“No one goes there any more, its too crowded.”
Yogi Berra
I don’t care who came up with the numbers, they are absurd on their face as you presented them. The idea that people are going to sit in congestion for 14 hours means they will spend 28 hours per day just commuting. But, if true, no need to worry about jobs. They won’t have time to work anyway…
“The Freight Committees are only suggesting that that they see a need to double our current ability to handle freight.”
Actually they haven’t made that claim that I have seen. They have projected that the amount of freight in the region is going to double by 2035. But the Region may have the “ability” to handle most of that increase already. A good portion of any new freight capacity is likely to be needed in new growth areas like Damascus.
In any case, the only solution to providing capacity for high value freight trips is to eliminate low value auto trips. Without a plan in place to control commuter traffic, new capacity built over the next 30 years won’t be available for freight in 2035 any case,
God loves Social Engineers
I love the folks who demand an engineering solution (more roads) to a social problem (congestion) and then call anyone who opposes their solution a “social engineer”.
Let’s turn down the hyperbole…
If the current 30-years Transportation Plans for the Portland region stay effect we may not have to worry about freight activity and population growth.
Since I can recall voting on an RTP update 3 years ago, on TPAC, and another is in the works for adoption in early ’08, we can hardly say we have a 30-year-old transportation plan. You may want a different set of policies, but the plans are current (and consistently have 2.5 times the number of projects that we can actually fund).
The idea that people are going to sit in congestion for 14 hours means they will spend 28 hours per day just commuting.
Let’s be fair. The 14-hour number is a project of how many hours per day the peak-hour level of congestion will spread to. No one is saying that a commuter will need 14 hours to commute to work. You can argue whether the number is accurate or not, but let’s not misconstrue what it means.
Chris, you are the big authority on tranportation so a couple of questions:
If we are to make some changes to rebuild the I-5 corridor through Portland and let say this committee come up with a recommendation that might go from the PDOT, ODOT and Metro that suggests that it should look at replacing the Marquam Bridge and bury the I-5 corridor from on the west from I-405/I-5 to the eastside up to the Freemont Bridge and include a all new buried I-84 exchange with I-5 what steps would have to be taken and what are the estimated time frames and when could the center of Portland choke point get eliminated and when could a project like get completed where the first vehicle could use it.
Most people do not have an idea of what has to happen and how long it takes even when we know what we want to do.
A few years ago I asked a retired ODOT Senior high level engineering manager how much he thought that it would cost. But I asked him to gestimate the cost with an above ground via duct over the rail tracks and he suggested that this would cost with a new Marquam Bridge and a new I-84 interchange about $8-Billion.
I think 2030 time frame to make anything happen to prevent collapse of mobility in the I-5 corridor, let alone freight mobility would be difficult if not impossible.
To me any decision to go along with the CRC Task Force recommendation that will put more traffic in the I-5 is only going to make some of the suggestion of pending problems and greater congestion even more likely.
There is not question that the CRC Project will limit or use all of the next 20-years of regional Federal Transportation Investment dollars earmarks for this one project.
So Lenny maybe right we cannot afford to do anyting so lets shut it down I-5 and make a new eastside Park.
One solution to part of the problem is to open the for hire transportation market. Allowing private buses, jitneys, more taxis and ride sharing cabs to provide services in the metro area will cost little, or nothing and perhaps solve a number of problems. Since our society is getting older and with a looming deficit that is getting larger hanging over our heads maybe it is time to try a novel approach, like open markets because raising tax dollars may be more difficult in the future.
M.H.W.
Chris, … a couple of questions
I don’t think we can build ourselves out of the I-5 corridor problem. The I-5 Partnership has already set its sites on 3 through lanes the length of the corridor through the region. Both the Delta Park project and the CRC are aspects of this plan, yet we don’t seem to think they’re going to solve the problem.
I would go back to what are the land use drivers behind the congestion in the corridor? It’s NOT trucks going from Tiajuana to Vancouver that are clogging the corridor (or trucks from Wilsonville to Battleground for that matter).
The largest user group are commuters from Clark County to the Oregon side of the river. So how about taking all the $$$ we plan to pump into the Columbia Crossing and put them into economic development in Clark County instead? Couple that with a tolling strategy (for both bridges) that gives freight a differential advantage and discourages commuters. Then we might be getting somewhere.
Of course, that’s “social engineering” :-)
If we continue to promote solutions that are about fast mobility over long distances, I don’t think we’re going to be satisfied with the results.
The 14-hour number is a project of how many hours per day the peak-hour level of congestion will spread to.
What exactly does that 14 hour number represent? Because that version doesn’t make any sense either. How do you have a 14 hour long peak?
My only point was and is that these numbers get thrown around (like “level of service F”) that leave people with a totally exaggerated picture of what is likely to happen.
Personally, sort of congestion relief, I think that the I-5 corridor needs better consistency and reliability. Right now, a single fender bender in the wrong place can effectively shut down the freeway.
The problem is largely due to too many merge points, abrupt lane endings (especially in lanes which inexperienced drivers may perceive to be a through lane), and local traffic being forced to get onto I-5 for short trips (Hayden Island, portions of the Expo Center area).
Replacing the bridges alone, no matter how many lanes cross the river, will do little or nothing to relieve congestion. Focusing on bottleneck removal and alternate local routes is not glamorous (and not cheap in I-5’s case), but would serve the needs of far more people.
As I have said before, bottleneck removal between the Marquam Bridge and the Columbia would involve a LOT of reconstruction… this is why the idea of a new I-5 route (tunnel, trench, elevated, what have you) is not so far-fetched.
– Bob R.
What is wrong with a 12 lane upgrade on I-5 like many cities are doing?
4 general purpose lanes, a carpool/bus lane, and a merging lane in each direction + evenly spaced interchanges would serve that corridor well for the next 30-50 years without the need for highly subsidized transit options or tax abated condo farms.
A series of express buses could serve as the transit component for the 1-5% who do not drive and the bus would pay for itself (the I-5 commuter service already draws a profit). The rest of the tax paying motorists could enjoy Portland’s first modern freeway since the early 80’s. Sounds like a plan!
Anthony –
I’m listening. What is your proposed alignment, how many homes would it knock down, and how much would it cost?
– Bob R.
uh, maybe you don’t live in Portland Anthony, but I have no idea how you would get 12 lanes on I-5 running both north and south. The Freeway is damn near locked in by housing and neighborhoods. There is simply not enough area for such a plan.
What is wrong with a 12 lane upgrade on I-5 like many cities are doing?
Oh, it would result in severe disruptions to surrounding neighborhoods, including many homes and businesses being torn down. It would be prohibitively expensive, unless the highway is tolled, thereby not attracting enough traffic to make it worthwhile. And it would only encourage to be inefficient and use their own private vehicle for trips where transit would be efficient and economical.
Good question.
For the most part, I-5 has enough room for an extra lane of traffic in each direction without knocking down homes. Decking the freeway would make room for all 12 lanes (6 on each level) without any sort of widening.
For cost, its going to be expensive. It will also be expensive to wait another 20 years before planners realize that social engineering didn’t work and that they need to widen the freeway anyway.
If motorist derived taxes were no longer diverted into transit/bike/urban planning/condo farms, there would be much more money to build a project of this scale.
Anthony –
Thanks for stating your proposal. I hope you can get some preliminary pricing together. If your proposal for a 12-lane, stacked/elevated I-5 through Portland costs the public less than all transit/bike/urban planning/condo farm capital projects to date, I’ll back it.
Best wishes,
Bob R.
you think you can deck a freeway for over 10 miles in a earthquake prone area is a smart thing to do? you think odot or any government agency is going to be repsonsible for that call? A totally unrealistic idea and not worth discussing. The only way to add capacity at such a scale is to go underground. Also I really don’t think Portlanders want a mega expressway running through downtown and it would never get the political pull.
Why would you want to dump 12 lanes of traffic into dowtown everyday with all that it entails? As Chris pointed out earlier, frieght is less than 10% of all traffic, why not try harder to keep Washington and it’s commuters on it’s side of the river?
The only way to add capacity at such a scale is to go underground.
How is undergrounding I-5 any better in an earthquake, if the tunnel collapses? What about a fire sucking out all the oxygen in the event of a major accident?
I don’t think a 12-lane wide I-5 is the answer, but certainly there is more traffic than the 4-lane or 6-lane I-5 can support. Why not compromise at 4 through lanes, plus one lane that would alternately be an acceleration/deceleration lane?
Portland already has lots of freeway stretches where there are more on/off ramps than what makes sense; and much of the freeway network could easily be streamlined by removing unnecessary or downright unsafe onramps.
As to whether congestion is a social issue, I argue not. Congestion is a direct result of overuse and limited supply. Now the reasons why more people use the highway – that is a social issue. But Metro’s fabled attempt to “fix” that social ill by strict land-use planning resulted in a drive-up of housing prices, thus lower-income folks (who typically benefit the most from living close-in) are forced to live further out and rely on the highways. And the City’s desire to replace all inner-city industrial land with more high priced housing creates more transportation problems than it solves.
Erik –
Regarding earthquakes, tunnels are generally much safer (depending on type of construction) than elevated structures. Tunnels move with the earth during a quake, while elevated structures sway and wobble in opposition to a quake.
– Bob R.
how about we just don’t grow so damn fast as everybody insists we must and will? why the hell does portland have to be any larger than it is now? why will the west coast need to ship, buy, and own twice as much crap as it does now?
i would like more data. i wonder if these predictions about increased congestion in 30 years assume that oil, and therefore the cost of shipping goods by truck, is going to remain stable in that time. i predict otherwise — rising oil prices will increase the cost of transporting anything. local industries will start to enjoy significant cost advantages over distant ones, and as production decentralizes, shipping trends will reverse.
if freight was really the cause of I-5 congestion, and it isn’t, then probably easier than any of this I-5 inflation would be to change how & where freight comes off of supertankers and enters the interstate. why not move the port to Hayden Island? i know it’s not cake to move the Port of Portland, but it sounds easier than burying an entire interstate.
or, freight could hop onto those convenient swan island train tracks, and ride short hauls to a transfer center in Vancouver, circumventing central Portland entirely. probably it would be slowed down a bit, but this is stuff that’s taken a week to cross the ocean — a few more hours won’t kill anybody. moving freight is not an emergency.
there’s probably even better solutions, but a 12-lane interstate isn’t one of them.
The central problem is that limited access highways cause congestion. You have to not only build the lanes of travel – but add capacity to get people on and off the freeway at the “limited” access points. If you double the number of people getting to Portland’s business centers at the same time, you have to double the local street capacity and the number of entry points to parking.
In essence, a 12 lane highway into the heart of Portland would be like using a fire hose to fill a bathtub. Not only will the bathroom be a mess, but the tub will never really fill.
if freight was really the cause of I-5 congestion, and it isn’t,
I don’t think anyone is arguing freight is the cause of congestion. Unfortunately the rhetoric thrown around would bring you to that conclusion. Reducing the amount of auto traffic by 10% would more than double the capacity available for freight. That is – if you could get those SOV commuters to take transit or car pool once every two weeks, you would have all the freight capacity the region needs.
if you could get those SOV commuters to take transit or car pool once every two weeks, you would have all the freight capacity the region needs.
There are two ways to do this.
Option 1: Call MCI (http://www.mcibus.com), order up a fleet of 20 “commuter coaches” D4505s at a cost of $400,000 each – or $8 million (certainly within reach of even TriMet’s depleted capital budget), and use them for “long distance” commute service from the outer edges. C-Tran, SMART, CAT, and Fareless SAM can also join in, as can Cherriots and YCAP (Yamhill County) and CVSSC (Newberg/Dundee).
The result is that while busses aren’t as sexy as light rail and doesn’t cost as much (read: not as much “federal investment”), it moves people along the very same corridor – the freeways – that people use. It provides convenient transfers with local busses to get people where they need to go. And if done right can attract just as many riders as MAX does that are new to transit.
Option 2: We sit around about 5-10 years, and if we’re lucky we can get a federal entitlement of a few million here or a few million there to “study” the problem we already know exists. In year 8, we decide that we’re simply going to build more light rail. Now we already know that light rail, just like the freeway system, doesn’t reduce congestion – in fact on the westside MAX creates more localized congestion, as the majority of riders are park-and-ride users, not bus-and-MAX riders. In year 10 or 11, just as TriMet is ready to recapitalize its bus fleet, it decides to take its entire capital budget and build another MAX line, and puts the bus system back on the back burner.
The result is that we have another MAX line, we don’t reduce congestion, and we further deplete the essential bus service necessary to connect MAX with everywhere else; and it took us 12-15 years to get there.
What the part of the problem is that people what a greater quality of life, do you blame them.
Fortunately we have a balance of the new and older generation who want to live in a very high density urban sitting and that is good for them and good for everyone who does not equate that life style with a greater or improved quality of life. Balance is good!
The big problem is that not enough people choose to live in the very urban setting.
What the result is that 70% to 75% (my estimate) choose to live in what comparison is the suburbs and there jobs or places of employment are not within a reasonable commute. In fact (maybe 80% cannot reach the place of employment with reasonable transit connection – again my estimate) they find themselves almost trapped into to the of rubber tired vehicles.
These quality of life decission have forced commuters on to our roadways in ever increasing numbers.
LRT, buses, bike and PED cannot make dent in this ever growing condition where the “Peak Period Rush Hour” just keep getting longer and longer on our main arterial and freeways.
As congestion get worse commuters starts overflowing on to our secondary arterials and city streets. They are looking for a way through the grid-lock. Some will re-visit all alternate modes transportation and that is good but those move from rubber tired vehicles will make only a minor reduction in the congestion.
So Chris was right in that we could and should put a lot more money into developing new job and industrial locations in our suburbs and that maybe more cost effective then trying to build ourselves out of this problem that we find ourselves in.
However we have a problem right now and that is becasue the places of employment and where people live are not connectable by reasonable alternative multi-mode choices other then by car.
So until we get jobs close to where people want to live we had better address the environment that we have and that is and ever increasing number of commuters on our roads and highways.
This means that the trucks that are the life blood of our freight dependent economy and maybe 3/4 of million local job’s (again my estimate) depend on reasonable condition that allow for good freight mobility in our just-in-time, supply chain world that we now live in.
I adovcate for freight specific capabilities that keep our economic engine running. They are as important as HOV lanes or more important. In fact why not put freight specific lanes in before ever considering any HOV lanes. If we do not have room then create a new Primarily Freight Specific alternate arterial Corridor, that gets freight and our trucks out of our passenger oriented arterials and freeways.
This can be done and wow! it would fee up a lot of space on our roadways. With new insight we might even create new multi-mode access connecting people to their jobs at the same time.
Erik Halstead said:
“If you could get those SOV commuters to take transit or car pool once every two weeks, you would have all the freight capacity the region needs.
There are two ways to do this.”
WOW! Good arguments, Erik. I couldn’t have said
it better.
Erik –
The question of light rail versus buses involves a number of issues.
1) If you are an employer who depends on transit to get your employees to work are you going to locate someplace based on a government promise that there will be transit? The certainty that comes with fixed rail systems is part of what achieves the levels of density that make them efficient.
2) Operator costs per passenger for light rail are much lower than they are for buses.
3) Buses do operate on the freeway and are unreliable as a result. When traffic is bad, they get behind schedule. With its own reight of way light rail is far more reliable.
4) Sexy is important. Just ask car dealers. People are willing to use light rail who won’t take a bus. You can call that irrational, but people don’t want to buy what you are selling. That’s the way the market works sometimes.
5) Coaches don’t bring in federal dollars. So where does the money come from to pay for them and their operation? CTRAN has been cutting its express service.
“It provides convenient transfers with local busses to get people where they need to go.”
What local busses? The idea that someone is going to sit on the freeway on a bus to get to a transfer point where service is on the hour is unlikely.
Light rail is not a miracle solution. But it has the huge advantage of not depending on a congested roadway to function effectively. I am not sure that many people who hate congestion are willing to sit in it on a bus instead of in their car.
Pail asks:
What the part of the problem is that people what a greater quality of life, do you blame them.
Well, my part of the problem is that those commuters who bought themselves such nice life-quality in the suburbs now want to fill the city I live in with even more freeways, polluting the air my family breathes with even more cancer-causing auto exhaust, so they can come work in Portland’s economy without having to actually participate in our communities.
I don’t exactly blame those suburbanites for wanting a greater quality of life though endless cheap gas and ever-more freeways, any more than I blame colonial slave-owners for wanting a better quality of life by freeing themselves from the drudgery of labor. Those people are just going along with what they’ve been taught to do. It’s the teaching, and the practices, that have to change in order for those people to wake up to the problem they’re causing.
Meanwhile: no new freeways please.
Erik says:
The result is that while busses aren’t as sexy as light rail and doesn’t cost as much (read: not as much “federal investment”), it moves people along the very same corridor – the freeways – that people use. It provides convenient transfers with local busses to get people where they need to go. And if done right can attract just as many riders as MAX does that are new to transit.
My wife always says: people will take public transit when it arrives faster than driving. The MAX line through the west hills can get commuters from Beaverton/Hillsboro to Portland even when 26 is backed up bumper-to-bumper. As the projections for congestion increase, MAX is going to start looking better and better to commuters. But nobody’s going to prefer being stuck in a bus to being stuck in their own car. How do you get riders onto these buses?
Of course, this whole advantage breaks down somewhat when the MAX gets to Central Portland and intersects rush-hour gridlock. Has anyone looked at burying the downton MAX?