'This was a tremendous rebound, and happened much faster than predicted,' said Richard D. Steinke, Port of Long Beach executive director. The increased activity brought back thousands of jobs and “we're very optimistic that the job growth in this industry will continue in 2011,' he added
Imports rose 23.4 percent in 2010 to 3.13 million TEUs, exports were up 15.6 percent to 1.56 million TEUs, and empties climbed 33.2 percent to 1.57 million TEUs.
Despite the increase last year, volumes are still behind where they were in 2005 to 2008 when annual volumes ranged from 6.5 million to 7.3 million TEUs.
