Interesting Times for Transportation
Transportation systems are very dynamic. During the last few years the railroads have become more competitive with rapid service from Chicago to Los Angeles in order to out-compete trucking companies. With this kind of service available, the large trucking companies have put more and more of their freight on the railroads double-stack container trains. Truckers are countering this competition with requests to be able to run heavier trucks on the Nations highways with weights up to 97,000# as opposed to the current 80,000# limits on most roads. This would drop the cost of transportation per ton for the shipper.
But as the railroads have gained market share, they now face an interesting test: The peak Christmas shipping season is upon us but so is the need to absorb a huge fall harvest of corn and soybeans that must be moved to market. Will the railroads be able to handle both peak seasons at the same time with their available capacity of equipment and people? Time will tell but the railroads claim they will be able to handle the heavy volumes of freight.
Union Pacific Railroad, Burlington Northern Railroad, Norfolk Southern Railroad, and CSX Transportation are all bringing on furloughed people who had been laid off during the recession. Union Pacific is bringing on 900 locomotives and a vast supply of hopper cars and containers to meet the demand. The locomotives had previously been in idle storage during the recent recession. Other railroads are doing much the same including bringing on line much new equipment that they were anticipating they would need. In addition, railroads are hiring new people and matching them with experienced people and moving them to specific areas around the country to deal with the logistics of moving long trains on a timely basis. So, hopefully, the Nations railroads are up to the task of meeting the demands of two peak seasons.
Meanwhile, the trucking industry has taken its hits from the Recession and many small carriers are now out of business creating a capacity shortage in some areas. Adding to their troubles are the new CSA 2010 regulations coming into effect on Nov. 1, 2010 that will target driver safety issues as never before. CSA 2010 will help to eliminate the unsafe drivers over a few months. The Winter months are normally slower for trucks and the loss of 3% to 5% of the nations truck drivers may not show up until Spring when freight demand picks up. But by then, trucking rates will increase due to the capacity shortage that will ensue due to a shortage of qualified drivers.
How does this all affect the shipper? Generally speaking, from a cost point of view, railroad container freight is less expensive for lanes exceeding 1300 miles between cities where both the pickup and the delivery from the rail terminal is within the Commercial Zone. Trucks are typically more cost efficient when the mileage between two cities is less than 1300 miles or where multiple stops are required along the route. Trucks have the advantage of being able to drive directly from the shippers dock to the receivers dock.
Property brokers are finding they must also be more creative to provide the best value to the customer. Larger Brokers move freight both on trucks and container railroads to meet their customers needs. The brokerage business is unique in that the largest broker in the U.S. only has 5% of the market share. According to the U.S.D.O.T., there are over 21,000 property brokers registered with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Brokers continue to grow as they provide the best value for their customers.
Another facet of the transportation industry are the freight forwarders—specifically those that are international in scope. Several years ago it was predicted that the large multi-national freight forwarders would gain more and more market share. Even though these large companies have grown, so has the market share. But the gains in market share have been by smaller freight forwarders who provide incredible service to their shippers. Why? Shouldn’t the bigger multi-national forwarder be able to drive costs lower for shippers? Yes, they do. But many shippers would rather be Number One with the forwarder they use knowing that that forwarder will do everything possible to get their shipments to their customers on time as opposed to being customer Number 273 with a large multi-national forwarder. The price is slightly more expensive with the smaller company, but the service is great and the shipper doesn’t need to worry about what would happen if the big multi-national has a conflict with the service needs of multiple shippers and the resulting costs and problems that would create with missed deliveries.
Transportation world-wide continues to be dynamic, competitive, and both service and cost oriented. Different modes of transportation compete with one another to present a better value proposition to the shipper. This is good! Despite the rough economy during the past few years, business is picking up! Shippers have more options than ever.
