Banning ocean freighters from the Great Lakes and requiring those ships to transfer cargo in Montreal would create more than a thousand new jobs for domestic shipping employees, truckers and rail employees, according to a new study.
The study could fuel the debate about whether the time has come to ban transcontinental ships from the St. Lawrence Seaway.
Critics have suggested closing the Seaway until shipping companies can prove ocean freighters are not importing more harmful foreign species into the lakes. The new study suggests there might be an economic incentive to keeping ocean ships out.
“We knew there were a fairly small number of jobs directly related to ocean shipping in the Great Lakes. We were surprised how few jobs there were, given the comments of the St. Lawrence Seaway administration,” said John C. Taylor, a Grand Valley State University economics professor who co-authored the study with transportation consultant James L. Roach.
The study did not advocate banning ocean ships from the Great Lakes. It analyzed whether such a move made economic sense.
Despite the myriad of problems invasive species imported by ocean freighters have caused in the lakes, the notion of barring them from the Seaway is “absurd,” said Terry Johnson, Jr., administrator of the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corp.
“The premise is that we would somehow abrogate a 100-year-old treaty with one of our largest trading partners and neighbor to the North, and that’s just not going to happen,” Johnson said. “This (study) is a paper exercise.”
Jennifer Nalbone, campaign director for Great Lakes United, said U.S. and Canadian officials who operate the Seaway should give the Taylor-Roach study an objective review.
“These experts are putting forth potential solutions for the trans-shipment of goods (from ocean freighters onto trucks and trains) and we would like to see the shipping industry respond with research instead of rhetoric,” Nalbone said.
Steve Fisher, executive director of the American Great Lakes Ports Association, said the notion of closing the Seaway to ocean ships is a “false idea.”
“No one except these two professors are even talking about it,” Fisher said.
Several environmental groups and a handful of lawmakers in the region have suggested closing the Seaway until ocean ships can prove their ballast water tanks are not carrying more foreign species into the lakes.
