(Radio Iowa) – A spokesman for the Department of Transportation says an agreement was reached earlier this month that will keep goods from backing up at ports in the eastern part of the U-S. Charlie Purcell (Per-sell)says dock workers had a short strike back in October. “They were able to resume work under the condition that they continue negotiations and work out some last some disagreements about the degree to which port facilities would be automated and the impacts that would have on dock workers jobs,” Purcell says. He says they recently reached a final agreement. “On January 8th the two parties were able to reach an agreement. The deadline that they had was January 15th, so we were thinking we might need to report on that,” he says. “But fortunately, that has they have reached an agreement, and that now goes to the union for a formal vote. So we’re not anticipating that we’ll have any major disruptions in the ports on the East Coast.”

Purcell says goods coming into Iowa by rail were down a bit last year. “Overall, 2024 through the whole year is down about two-point-nine ( 2.9%) percent in terms of railcar loads. This is measured on a six week moving average as compared to 2023 so you can see that we’re kind of back to more or less normal levels for the last part of this year,” he says.

Purcell made his comments during an update for the state Transportation Commission Tuesday.