An investigation of the relationship between Class I railroad employment and TEU traffic at the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, California: 1997--2006

The twin ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, California have become the focal point of the influx of containers from East Asia and China. The purpose of this study is to determine the relationship between monthly Class I Transportation (T&E) employment and combined monthly TEU traffic at the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, California for the years 1997 through 2006. The Spearman Rank-order Correlation Coefficient was administered to analyze the relationships. Results indicated that proximity is not the sole factor in a relationship between monthly Class I Transportation (T&E) employment and combined monthly TEU traffic at the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles. This study also contains a historical analysis of the development of railroad intermodal transportation.