DOT seeks members for work group on port performance

The United States Department of Transportation is under a mandate to develop statistics measuring port productivity and creating a working group to provide advice.    The Bureau of Transportation Statistics at the U.S. Department of Transportation is seeking nominations for representatives from industry, labor and academia to participate on a working group tasked with developing metrics on port performance.
   The Port Performance Freight Statistics Working Group solicitation was published in Tuesday’s Federal Register.
   The panel was mandated by Congress in last December’s FAST Act, which set spending policy for highway infrastructure and safety for the next five years, following incidents of major gridlock in late 2014 and early 2015 at West Coast ports. Retailers and and other businesses that depend on ports to facilitate the movement of their goods want to avoid a similar supply chain breakdown in the future and hope data can provide some kind of early warning system so productivity declines can be addressed.
   The Port Performance Working Group It is expected to generate recommendations for statistics measuring U.S. port capacity and throughput, specify standards for collecting and reporting that data in a nationally consistent and timely manner, and identify ways to safeguard proprietary information.
   Under the law, the working group must include one member each from the rail, trucking, maritime, and marine terminal industries, several labor members crossing all industry sectors, a port authority and the Transportation Research Board. 
   The working group will be allowed to establish subcommittees on which other subject matter experts can serve.
   Nominations must be received within 30 days.
   Last month, a federal advisory committee at the Department of Commerce sent Secretary Penny Pritzker a list of best practices for industry and government on how to avoid port congestion.