FanPro D Newsletter Oct. 2006 Options

[Slithery D]

The ports that avoid the difficult overland travel become more valuable. California ports in 2070 cut short the sea distance involved in shipping directly to the Gulf or east coast, but introduce logistical problems with the required land distribution that don't exist today. LA and Seattle - less business. Houston, NYC - more business. This was even more the case prior to 2065 when the Panama Canal was neutral, the PCC was landlocked, and the Ute were still around to be pains in the asses about the white man's trade passing through their borders.

If France is hostile to Germany you don't ship goods to Spain and put them on a train to Germany unless that extra distance at sea is prohibitively expensive. I'm suggesting only that there is some material substitution of trade away from today's patterns. It makes less sense to ship Japanese cars to LA and put them on a train to points east of the Mississippi. Ergo, fewer cars will be shipped, and the west coast ports are less important.

All that's necessary for this to be true is that for some products (cost of land transport from CA to UCAS/CAS) + (tariffs, inspections, and other bureacratic delays) + (security concerns/possible disruptions of crossing NAN states requiring disruptive longer sea routing) > (cost of additional sea borne transport direct to east/Gulf coast) + (cost of land transport from port to domestic location) + (security concerns/possible disruptions from crossing Aztlan controlled canal requiring longer routing around Asia/Africa).

Surely that equation favors the displacement of some west coast trade to longer sea borne traffic direct to east/Gulf coast ports. If tariffs and other trade hindrances are high, that's the game right there. Even if you think the Aztlan security issue is obviously more pressing than the NAN rail blockade scenario, in that event you can always just pay higher costs and accept some delays to ship things west around Africa/Asia to your same established destination port. If the NAN shuts your land links down, you've got to work out a whole new logistics chain involving east coast ports that suddenly have higher traffic and where you lack established, regular business.

[Demonseed Elite]

Unfortunately, this is another case where you're missing information present in Shadows of Latin America. Wuxing owns substantial sea trade assets, including the largest shipping interest in the Caribbean/Gulf Coast region. Wuxing also gets preferential treatment and discounts at the Nicaragua Canal.

[fistandantilus4....]

[Demonseed Elite]

Most of it is probably going to Seattle, I imagine. Though if Los Angeles is going to be in Corp Enclaves, I have to assume it'll probably have a functional port too. But I have no idea what they are going to do with it.

[fistandantilus4....]

I was thinking Seattle as well, except for the part in Runner Havens where they said that the ports weren't getting as much business , and people were losing jobs. Could be on to something there with the Corp Enclaves thing though. Either way, it should be interesting to see what gets written there. Who ever's doing has a big load to work with.

[kzt]

[fistandantilus4....]

A lot of the stuff on California has just shown up as small little bits lately. Last thing with any amount of space given to it was all the stuff going on w/ Saito and Ares. I'm thinking that with more space and effort devoted to it, it'll come out looking nicer. Here's to hoping *cheers*

[Draconis]