The Docks by Bill Sharpsteen

A review by John Pattison

One of the peculiarities of our high-tech society is that much of what sustains it is invisible or simply unnoticed by most of us most of the time. We flick a switch and the lights come on. We drive to the supermarket and find the shelves stocked to overflowing. How all this is made possible doesn't usually rate a second's thought.

The Port of Los Angeles and nearby Port of Long Beach are enormous and complex operations with a simple goal: to import and export (mostly import) vast amounts of stuff as efficiently and effectively as possible. Sprawling across 10,700 acres of Southern California waterfront -- an area fifteen times the size of Central Park -- they are the two busiest ports in the country, together accounting for 40 percent of waterborne cargo in the United States, more than half of which ends up east of the Rockies. In 2008, the Port of Los Angeles alone was responsible for $243.7 billion of global trade. Five days a year -- Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year'...

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