Appearing today in
The Times is this article about maritime port congestion:
Fair Use:
.Off the coast of Los Angeles, more than two dozen container ships filled with exercise bikes, electronics and other highly sought imports have been idling for as long as two weeks.
In Kansas City, farmers are struggling to ship soybeans to buyers in Asia. In China, furniture destined for North America piles up on factory floors.
Around the planet, the pandemic has disrupted trade to an extraordinary degree, driving up the cost of shipping goods and adding a fresh challenge to the global economic recovery. The virus has thrown off the choreography of moving cargo from one continent to another.
At the center of the storm is the shipping container, the workhorse of globalization..
Now what remains to be determined is if this present"overload" of maritime facilities is a "new normal" or if this present demand for home consumer goods will decrease as COVID becomes a memory. If the former, then Chessie, as she dreams away in her Pullman Berth, has visions that the year round Northern New England ports she will have access to as soon as the Maine Central becomes hers, will be developed, and she rebuilds her new railroad, will both become "players" in a consumer environment of continued demand for imported goods.