United States (U.S.) ports of entry (POEs) and supply chains (SCs) have a prominent trade relationship with a growing desire to improve their operational capabilities. Though trade deals like the U.S.-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) agreement have facilitated trade between these countries, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) at POEs have also increased security inspections, following the September 11th incident, which have impacted international and global SCs. More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused labor shortages at both sea and land POEs, increasing vessel and commercial vehicle congestion. These POE disruptions have also propagated into the third-party logistics (3PL) of SC networks, which has increased transportation costs. In this thesis, we explored operational improvement strategies from the perspectives of the public sector (i.e., U.S.-Mexico POEs) and the private sector (i.e., 3PL SC networks). The goal of this study was to understand the relationship between transportation disruptions and international trade
