Two things which I observed on my intial reading of the report and the executive summary:

1. The report mentioned on page 37 (page 48 of the electronic version) that Huntsville Alabama and Columbus Ohio had foreign trade zones (free-trade zones). I did not notice that in the report's summary. It think that will be an important factor in improving Prince George's ability to draw as much business as possible.

This link gives the advantages of such zones in the USA in point form:
http://www.elpasointernationalairport.com/ftz.html

2. The First Avenue CN yards are shown as a possible site. That may cause the downtown of PG never accessing the river. Then again, looking at the postive side, if the City takes the postion that they will support such a move if the development is carried out in such a way that the facility is bridged at several locations by a connection of downtown to the river. I believe that can be done if everyone from business to the three levels of government work on it from the start.

On the other hand, the BCR south area may be more appropriate since it is less constrained by urban development and has potentially easier highway access, including the fact that it is situated on the envisaged link improvement between 16 and 97.

It is a no brainer that the port should not,I repeat, should not be on 1st Ave. When most forward thinking communities are making the most of any water front or river front areas to enhance their community for its residential, recreational, cultural and sporting usage it would be a total backward step to again allow industry to waste this resource. there are many other options for the industry. However, Prince George has been forever known to take the stup[id route so I expect no better this time around, particularly since we are blessed with a mayor whose only vision is for his monied friends and his travel budget and a council to void of backbone to insist on a vision.

BTW, I mentioned pharmaceuticals in one of the threads on the stand up for the north conference. The report uses the example of Boeing planes being assembled in Everett, while the parts are manufactured globally and transported to Everett. The same is true for other industries, including the automotive industry.

Pharmaceuticals is another one of those. The old standard is that all the elements which make up the industry are clustered together in one location. In Europe that was traditionally around chemical industries (Bayer as an example) and in North America typically around biological research industries.

That has been changing over time as it has in other industries. In order to be competitive, companies have been sourcing the various elements throughout the world and clustering them through the changes in modern communication and transportation infrastructure.

Thus, while PG is not a centre of the pharmaceutical industry - nowhere close to that - it may have some of the attributes required for one or more of the integrated elements to produce pharmaceuticals. In a new age of business, it may be able to participate in many such industries which it would not have been able to do 50 years ago and even 20 years ago.

We need people at the helm who come with an open mind and are capable of doing business in the 21st century, not the 20th.

Remember, we are just one of the elements in the cluster of paper products manufacturing. We do not do the whole thing here. Maybe we should be producing fine paper here.

We are also only one of the elements in the cluster of building construction. We supply only the lumber, and in a very small way, assembled structures (log buildings) Even there, we could improve by manufacturing more universally acceptable and, more importantly, affordable milled wood structural systems such as the following Canadian and US examples.

http://www.panabode.com
http://www.lincolnlogs.com

Time for more people to join the small group in town ready to take on the challenge of matching opportunities with our capacity to take them on.

I agree completely, postman.

Lets keep this as simple as possible.

1. The report basically states that if a Inland Container facility is built it will primarily handle forest products from shippers within a 100 mile radius of Prince George BC.

2. What it doesnt tell you is that this Pulp, Paper, and Lumber is presently all sent to Vancouver, BC via Rail and Truck and loaded into Containers in Vancouver. Approx 75,000 40ft containers per year.

3. They dont mention that the Pulp Mills and Lumber Mills in North Central BC are operating at capacity and all of their production is presenlty sold to the Continental USA, Europe, and Asia. So that there is not any capacity (especially for the Pulp Mills) to produce anymore product, I suspect the same applies to the sawmills at this time. So unless you can increase capacity then the amount of material available for shipment remains static.

4. If you take the available material that is presently being loaded into containers in Vancouver and load them into containers in Prince George, it would be the same amount of tonnage only it would be moving to Prince Rupert, instead of Vancouver.

5. If this tonnage doesnt move to Vancouver then you will have reduced trains to Vancouver and of course a significant drop in truckloads of Pulp, Paper, and Lumber to Vancouver. This will mean reduced trains to Vancouver offset by increased trains to Prince Rupert (No net gain) There will be lost trucking jobs to Vancouver, however these will be replaced by truck jobs, picking up and delivering containers within the 100 Miles of Prince George. (No net gain)

6. Shippers in the Greater Prince George area are presently loading rail cars and trucks to Vancouver BC for export. If they decide to ship to Prince Rupert then they will load these containers at their plant. As a example an empty container would be taken to Quesnel loaded with pulp and returned to Prince George for loading on a Train. Therefore there will be very little if any reason to have this tonnage handled through a warehouse in Prince George, as this would only mean you would handle it twice. This certainly would apply to Woodpulp and Paper, and to a large degree to Lumber. Therefore (no net gain)

7. There are thousands of Refrigerated Trucks per year that haul produce from California/Vancouver/ etc; to the North Centreal Interior, plus Kitimat, Terrace, Prince Rupert. All these trucks depend on getting backhauls to Vancouver, and presenlty load, Lumber,Woodpulp,Paper, on their return trip. If this product is now going to be loaded to Prince Rupert in Containers, then these trucks will lose their backhauls, and you will immediatly get an increase of $850.00 per truck on the inbound load of produce, that will increase the cost of fruit and vegetables in every store in the Northern Interior. I notice this fact was not mentioned in the report.

8. CN Rail presenlty handles all the Rail Cars to Vancouver BC with Lumber, Paper, Woodpulp, for loading into Containers and Breakbulk. They will determine if it is in their best interests to take this tonnage away from Rail cars and load it into Containers. It will all depend on the cost. At present one rail car is the equivilant of 4-40ft Containers. In other words it takes one railcar to move 200,000 lbs of Woodpulp and it takes two railcars to move 4 40ft Containers with a weight of 50,000lbs apiece. There are other factors involved, but it will be interesting to see if Containers to Rupert are competitive with Rail Cars to Vancouver and stuffing there. If CN can get these empty containers loaded before they get to Prince George then they would get the best of both worlds.

9. No mention of the fact that while Chinese imports are increasing at a huge rate, imports from other South East Asia Countries must be declining, as they all serve the same market. At the end of the day it matters little how much more production is increased in China because at some point on the North American Continent you reach a saturation point, and then shipments will tend to flatten out.

There are a number of other areas that the report is somewhat vague on, however suffice to say that for the most part, it says exactly what the people who paid for the report wants it to say.

Balderdash would sum it up nicely.

What's the big deal about being able to drive down the river from downtown? Get off yer butt and walk the trails that are already there.

If Owl has his way the river bank will become more attractive for the bums that already plague our downtown. The river bank access is fine as it is. Don't go using CN's plan as an opportunity to mess up what we have.

Booting out Brink, Winton, La Pas, Esso and CN and turning the area into a park does nothing for the area. It just increases the cost to taxpayers, makes a place for dogs to poop and lots of room for bums. Just makes downtown that much more irrelevant, if that's the plan.

Hey Palopu

Market share.........take it from them allows that capacity to be filled by others. In addtion it enhances our capacity to do what we don`t do now.

That is the battle that Vancouver and Seatle have been in for many years.

Yama
What about Central Park and Stanley Park and Fort George Park???

Should we put industry in those places and run trains around the outside? That would clean up the whole planet.

Seriously though, access to waterfront anywhere is good for community recreation as well as industry. We both know that it is what created our City but that was then.
Growing up in Vancouver I remember the industry around False Creek and still water skied the area. I must admit that today it is a lot nicer place for the community and industry has evolved to other areas.

Runner46. We are already doing it to Vancouver, it will make no difference if we do it to Prince Rupert. It is the same business going in a different direction.

I will make it easy for you. Drive 500 Miles to Vancouver and throw a rock in the Ocean. Then drive 500 miles to Prince Rupert and throw a rock in the Ocean. Get the point. Its all the same.

Load a truck here to Vancouver or load a Container here to Prince Rupert. Same thing. Get it.

Palopu ....

Premise 1 - trade has been increasing .... and it has been

Premise 2 - the increase has been primarily to the west of here - and that can be shown also

Premise 3- trade will continue to increase - that cannot be shown, it is a prediction which may very well be wrong, so there is a risk determination which must be made by investors ....

Premise 4 - in order to participate in the predicted continuing increase of trade, one has to increase infrastructure if the present one is operating at capacity, otherwise someone else will increase their capacity, such as Seattle or Los Angeles.

Premise 5 - one can increase capacity by opening up new facilities or expanding existing facilites.

So, the method being used by adding Prince Rupert is opening up new facilties. That means a whole new dynamic is created. It means that trucking routes will be shortened and rail routes will be more effectively used. Job opportunities will be shifted. The status quo will be interrupted. Vancouver will develop new capacity due to a partial shift from south to north. Containers there can be filled by frozen vegies, car parts, whatever, while the low add on value products will be shipped through the North.

Products shipped from the south will become more expensive? Good, that will open up the opportunity to manufacture products in the North. Add an ever increasing fuel cost and it will make products created here even more likely to become options or alternative systems.

However, some people simply do not learn that since it costs around $100 to fly in a sheet 54 pound 1/2 inch by 4 ft x 8 ft drywall to a place like Old Crow, which is only accessible by air, they should be looking at locally sawn t&g boards as an interior wall finishing material.

Times change. Get the point?

YDPC ..... I said nothing about parks on the river. There is already a large park as well as a river trail system. Why do you automatically think park?

What is not there is a "bridging" of the gap presented by the rails from downtown to the river. If that were open then the river would make a prime area for development of housing, for instance, built on land raised above the flood plain as a couple of new residences and the hatchery have been.

Of course, it would also be a great location for a restuarant or two, some more office space (Winton Global is already there with a very nice walk and riverbank control to the north of the building), perhaps a hotel, and so on. I am talking about long range should the city grwo by say, 20,000 or so. It would give an alternative to suburban living stretching further and further from the centre of the city.

Of course, this would not make the DBIA very happy since this is not housing in their towel of a piece of downtown. If it ain't happenin' in their slice of what is actually the downtown of Prince George, then it ain't worth pursuing because it ain't gonna help them.

Here is an example from the New Westminster "quay side" medium density housing development on the Fraser. It has has a much used rail track running right behind it. This used to be industrial riverfront.

http://flickr.com/photos/d-a-m/198613801/in/set-72057594118235937

http://flickr.com/photos/d-a-m/198612259/in/set-72057594118235937

A hotel in the forefront and the market in the background with the green roof http://flickr.com/photos/d-a-m/198637283/in/set-72057594118235937

The river boardwalk with housing adjacent to it.
http://flickr.com/photos/d-a-m/198625653/in/set-72057594118235937/

I realize this might be too urban for some .... so let's stay a hick town with weeds along the river ......

;-)

http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=4187620&size=o

http://flickr.com/photos/41901408@N00/1007617
http://flickr.com/photos/chartsky/99125001
http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=105840643&size=o
http://flickr.com/photos/studio-d/37400342/

take your pick, and then some .....

Owl.

Premise 6. People with swelled heads have trouble finding a hat that fits.

At some point you have to relate what has happened in the past to what you can expect to happen in the future, and make judgements accordingly. As an example we know that Prince Rupert to this time in History has never been considered a serious export teminal. Tonnage through this port decreased on a regular basis from 1994 to 2005. This Container Terminal will give it a boost, however, it will not make a significant difference over all, mainly because the plans for the future are to small. Also Prince Rupert faces major competition from the following;

1. Possible 5.5 Billion widening of the Panama Canal to facilitate bigger ships carrying Asian goods to US East Coast and Gulf of Mexico.(10 years)

2. Houston Texas building a Container Terminal to serve Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Home Depot Inc. distribution centres.

3. The largest container company in the world A.P. Moller-Maersk group of Copenhagen, is building a new terminal in Norfolk, VA.

4. New facilities are under way or planned in smaller ports in Mobile Ala. Wilington N.C. and Jacksonville, Fla.

5. Kansas City Southern Railway is pushing a Mexican port as the answer.

6. Giant terminal operator Hutchison Whampoa Ltd of Hong Kong plans to buiild a new container terminal in Lazaro Cardenas Mexico by the end of next year.

The list goes on. So you can see that even though trade is increasing so are the facilities to handle them.

In any event at some point trade will level off and the competition will get stiffer. Its at that point that we will see if Prince Rupert can survive.

Nothing of any significance from the Prince Rupert Port will trickle down to Prince George, so I suggest that you do not go out and make any long term investments.

"Premise 6. People with swelled heads have trouble finding a hat that fits."

Palopu ... I have enough of you and your personal attacks ... see ya....

Prince George isn't ready for a container port. Prince George doesn't look after the long time taxpayers as it is.
Further development without consideration for the existing tax base would just compound past errors.

I agree. I also think that we should nto be selling off good property just so thst some developers can reap the benefits. We should bank it for at least 25 years till we know what is going on in this community. We are selling our land for far too little money. Until greedy developers wisen up, we need to sit on our major asset.

;-)

"Sit on our major asset" HeeHee!

There is some real speculation going on around the PG Airport. Too much I think. I suspect Owl is going to get his wish as someone is going to be sitting on their assets for more than twenty five years, or a very long time.
I know of a 114 acre property in the city that was picked up by "investors" in 1978. These guys love vacant land, very low taxes and no need to do anything but sit on their asset. Doesn't do PG much good with these huge parcels being frozen by non residents. Certainly ties up development in PG.

"Certainly ties up development in PG."

I am not quite understanding how that would tie up development.

In the 1960's the typical city in Ontario had farm land all around it "tied up" by outright purchases with lease backs or options to purchase. As the cities grew, these properties were used to build suburbia as we have come to know them and love them today. In the case of PG, the land was generally owned by the City, College Heights being the major exception, and it was developed by the city into the same type of suburbia, with the lots sold off at auction.

What "ties up" development of a piece of property is lack of opportunity, lack of a customer to buy or lease any improvements made to the property. Without the population growth we had in the 60's and 70's in PG, the only pressure to develop properties is to increase and improve services to the residents.

With a relative steady population over at least a 10 year period, the demand for new housing is primarily driven by reduced number of people per houshold and the demand for commercial space has been typicaly driven by a change in retail strategy from small retailers in malls to large box stores. Thus, we have empty mall spaces which was never the case, and new box retail spaces being built at Domano and Hwy 16.