3 rail projects are touted to upgrade Pier B Rail operation

Three rail improvement projects that will give a jump start to the Port of Long Beach’s longrange Pier B OnDock Rail Support Facility development received approval from the harbor commission this week.

The $22.8 million allocation, which the commission approved Monday, will push three projects forward that will increase track capacity at the existing Pier B Rail Yard by 80% by 2025.

The overall Pier B project, approved in 2018, won’t be finished

for more than a decade, with the current estimate putting completion at 2032.

Designs and other details of the three advanced projects will be brought back to the Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners for approval later this year.

The goal of the Pier B OnDock Rail Project is to rely more on rail to carry cargo to and from the port — reducing truck traffic and pollution.

“This will be a gamechanger once the project is concluded, estimated in 2032,” said Port of Long Beach Executive Director Mario Cordero. “We’re on our way toward moving forward” with this project.

In 2018, commissioners approved an $870 million budget to reconfigure, expand and enhance the capacity of the Pier B on-dock rail facility, increasing the port’s ability to use longer trains to move cargo more quickly and reduce pollution.

The Pier B On-Dock Rail Project is part of efforts to reduce pollution at the nation’s second busiest port.

The ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles have for years jointly worked on the Clean Air Action Plan to significantly reduce emissions. That includes reducing port-related greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030 and to 80% by 2050. The plan also calls for the ports to have 100% zero-emission trucks by 2035.

Staff will provide a comprehensive update on the on-dock rail facility in September.

The port also is continuing to look at cleaner train technology, including battery and fuel cell technologies, said Chief Harbor Engineer Mark Erickson. Those aspects of the program, he said, will be flexible.

“We’re tracking a couple of promising technologies,” he said. “We’re monitoring them to see how they progress to become proven technologies.

“This is such an exciting project,” said Commissioner Sharon Weissman. “As this moves forward, it gives us the ability to move more containers from trucks and onto rail, as many of the (environmental) groups have asked us to do.”

The entire Pier B program includes 13 different individual projects. The three early rail improvement projects funded at Monday’s regular board meeting are ready to advance now, according to the board report, and will add 18,000 track feet by 2025.

The advanced projects, port officials said, will provide benefits on an earlier timeframe in what is a longrange program.

“This is a slightly more aggressive program than we were talking about in 2018,” Erickson said.