Work to unload a vessel carrying steel for the Bay Bridge seismic retrofit project remains on hold today while Caltrans officials try to resolve a dispute over which union should do the work.
Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said his agency is meeting with the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and American Bridge/Fluor Enterprises, which is working with Caltrans to build the Bay Bridge's new eastern span.
The meeting began at 9 a.m. today and there's no estimate on when it will conclude, Ney said.
The ship, called the Zhen Hua, has been docked at Pier 7 at the Port of Oakland since Friday and no effort has been made to offload it since its arrival, Ney said.
American Bridge hired members of unions representing iron workers and operating engineers to do the work, but the ILWU says it has an exclusive right to unload such vessels at the Port of Oakland.