Port of Long Beach Traffic Management While Building New Gerald Desmond Bridge and Middle Harbor Container Terminal

The Port of Long Beach (POLB) is the premier US gateway for trans-Pacific trade and a trailblazer in innovative goods movement, safety, environmental stewardship, and sustainability. As the second-busiest container seaport in the United States, POLB handles trade valued at more than $194 billion annually. Providing well-coordinated traffic management is critical to enhancing the port’s overall operations. Infrastructure projects at the POLB, small and large, all involve some level of traffic management. The larger the project, the greater the need to minimize impacts to port operations and the movement of people and goods through the port’s transportation system. In 2021, the POLB completed two major multi-year construction projects, the Gerald Desmond Bridge (GDB) Replacement Project and the Middle Harbor Redevelopment Project. The success of these projects largely depended on how well extremely complicated construction activities were coordinated and operated within the dynamic port area. It took a significant amount of effort from all port divisions and terminal operators, as well as constant communication between both internal and external stakeholders to address traffic management issues. Having a dedicated, efficient, and coordinated traffic management team greatly alleviated the potential for turmoil arising from simultaneously coordinating billion-dollar construction projects with a combination of operational challenges, including the steady increase in trade over the last decade, servicing some of the world’s largest container ships, and heavy truck traffic and queueing in and out of the terminals. Effective coordination also required close interaction with port railroad operators to ensure they were informed about construction and roadway traffic changes. In April 2013, when the GDB Replacement Project announced upcoming construction activities and roadway closures, there were serious concerns from the Port of Long Beach’s tenants/terminal operators. This led to the formation of the Port Area Construction Traffic (PACT) team. The primary focus of the PACT team was to help the bridge contractor successfully implement the construction schedule and, at the same time, ensure the uninterrupted flow of roadway traffic. This team included representatives from multiple divisions within the port and external partners. The team met on a weekly basis and was later renamed the Port Traffic Management (PTM) team. This effort also included innovative technology support from the port’s security team, which was responsible for the installation of hundreds of closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras and the use of an online dashboard portal called the “virtual port” to access the live video feed from the CCTV cameras. This paper discusses the evolution of various traffic management strategies and innovative technologies that the team used as part of the successful completion of the GDB Replacement and Middle Harbor projects, along with several other key infrastructure projects within the port.