Chances are, port touches your life

John Mohr, the director of the Port of Everett, gave a talk last week entitled “Six Degrees of Separation.”

The title was patterned after a play by that name introduced in 1990 and made into a movie in 1993.

The movie morphed into a popular game called “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” in which you try to link other actors with Bacon by associating them with people in various movies or commercials. The idea is to not use more than six connections to get to Bacon.

Now there’s a Facebook platform called Six Degrees.

Things can get a bit complicated trying to figure out all of those links, but Mohr’s point was a simple one. Few people know much about the port, but you don’t have to go far to find a connection between it and your own life.

He mentioned three areas where it’s likely that your life and the port’s activities intersect: boats, cargo and recreation.

Boatwise, the port operates the largest public marina on the West Coast, with slips for more than 2,300 vessels. It’s nearby boat ramp at the 10th Street Marine Park is the largest public launch in the state.

I’ve never kept a boat at the marina, but I have a lot of friends who have. And I’ve certainly used the launch plenty.

While cargo doesn’t immediately sound like a solid link, you probably have a friend or family member who has a job related to what comes in or goes out of the Port of Everett.

Port activity generates 12,277 direct jobs in the area. There are also 4,455 jobs at businesses that provide services or supplies for the port’s activities and 14,347 induced jobs, meaning people who supply goods and services to the people directly employed in port activity, according to a port study.

The study reported that port activity generates $2.7 billion in local wages and purchases.

The port has eight berths for international cargo, a bulk unloading facility that holds cement from Asia for Northwest construction projects, a big warehouse and a barge pier that mostly handles oversized containers of Boeing Co. jet parts that go to the company’s Everett plant on a rail spur.

The port sends and receives goods from Japan, Russia, South Korea and China, with aerospace parts as its major import, followed by cement, wind energy components, heavy machinery, transformers and general containers.

While it is eclipsed by the container operations in Seattle and Tacoma, Everett is the state’s third-largest container port.

“You’d be surprised what comes across the dock in the Port of Everett on any given day,” Mohr said.

Recreationally, the port owns Jetty Island, which offers the largest sand beach on Puget Sound.

Mohr noted that the beach had 47,000 visitors last year through a program run by the Everett parks department. He also noted that the island is one of the more popular kiteboarding sites on the West Coast and will feature a kite-boarding festival this year.

Mohr mentioned a lot of other stuff, but that should give you enough information to see how the port hooks up to your life. I didn’t have the time nor the energy to try to link the port to Kevin Bacon, but that shouldn’t stop you from doing that yourself.

Let me know if, like the game, you make it in six steps.

Mike Benbow: 425-339-3459; benbow@heraldnet.com.

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