Flat seas ahead.

• Author: Swagel, Will
• Position: Water transportation in Alaska

Smooth sailing means slow growth for water transportation.

Flat calm may be good for navigation, but it's less exciting as a business forecast. Unfortunately, that's the word on growth prospects in ocean transportation in the next year, according to industry experts. "That's correct; it's going to be very flat," says Shari Gross, a lobbyist for the Port of Tacoma and the Tacoma representative on the Alaska State Chamber of Commerce board.

"Flat would be almost optimistic," says Sea-Land's general manager of Alaska service Jim McKenna. "A downturn of 1 or 2 percent wouldn't be out of the question." Neither oil production nor government, especially military spending, are likely to see a surge in 1995, experts believe.

"We look at it as a very soft market pending the oil companies' status and the military's status," says Dick Simpson of Crowley Maritime Corp. "That's something I don't think anyone has their finger on." The out look, he says, has made his company think conservatively about its Alaska runs for the future.

But there is some good news. The water transportation industry-resource development-dependent, as well as population-dependent - has been buoyed by the elevation of Alaska Republicans in Congress to key resource committee posts.

"As you and probably all Alaskans know, this bodes well for resource development projects," says Gross. "Whereas this year might be flat, there might be more out on the horizon."

Southcentral Sails

For Totem Ocean Trailer Express (TOTE), 1994 was "a good year, [but] a funny year from our standpoint," says Ev Trout, vice president of sales and operations. The year saw the city of Anchorage settle with industry in a dispute over rates.

TOTE benefited when a Teamster strike disrupted business at Sea-Land, forcing that company to move operations temporarily from its Tacoma home port to Vancouver, British Columbia.

Trout reports a dip in the middle of the year when Arco announced cutbacks, "but then it was a very strong fall."

While the Anchorage retail boom - which meant a lot of shipping - has slowed down over the days of construction and stocking the stores, Trout says there are still some capital projects fueling business in the near future. He points to the hospital at Elmendorf Air Force Base, the Healy coal project and Fort Knox mine near Fairbanks, the Anchorage courthouse and the Alaska Native Medical Center as examples.

Construction and expansion, too, are on the minds of the people who run the...