The United States is a maritime nation. From its origin as 13 former colonies to its place as the pre-eminent world power today, our Nation's success has been dependent on our coastal ports and inland waterways to conduct trade. Recognising the importance of transportation to trade, the Nation had made a strong intergenerational commitment to develop its transportation networks. These networks of highways, railways and inland waterways connect the interior of our country to our ports, which connect us to the rest of the world. These transportation networks have contributed to our success by providing a cost-efficient and environmentally sustainable means to transport large quantities of cargo over long distances and across oceans, keeping this Nation competitive in world trade. This book provides an analysis of the broad challenges and opportunities presented by the increasing deployment of post-Panamax vessels and outlines options on how Congress could address the port and inland waterway infrastructure modernisation issues needed to accommodate those vessels.

Ports and Inland Waterways is a review of sources of statistics on ports and inland waterways in the United Kingdom and covers subjects such as foreign traffic by commodity; coastwise traffic by commodity; special traffic; scheme and non-scheme port traffic; container and roll-on traffic; contents of containers; driver accompanied and unaccompanied road goods vehicles; and restow movements. Transhipment and transit movements are also included, along with fishery traffic, passenger traffic, and shipping movements. This volume is comprised of 12 chapters and begins with an overview of ports and shipping places in the United Kingdom, with emphasis on standardization, collection, and collation of port statistics on a national basis and the creation of the National Ports Council under the Harbours Act of 1964. A brief summary of industry activity concerned and its organization is given in order to present a clear background understanding of how data are collected; what is being measured; the stage at which measurements are made; what the reporting units are; the channels through which returns are routed; and where they are processed. Statistics of customs ports and other areas of the industry are then provided, including those of manpower and finance. Proposed developments for the industry are discussed in the last chapter. This book will be of interest to transportation officials, statisticians, economists, and social science researchers.