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ed: Regarding shorthaul, if not by truck, then by what? It's my understanding that trucking owns 99.9% of all shorthual moves. (The 0.1% is accomplished by shortline railroad here in the PNW, where several companies run shorthaul grain shuttles between elevators and barge ports, in hauls under 100 miles). You are correct that if the driver is responsible for loading and unloading the cargo, it takes away from the number of shorthaul trips per day or per week that pay the per mile wages. But if the loading and unloading is done by other labor, then all the driver is doing is taking the trailers from one locale to the next. Or if the driver is heading to or from the intermodal yard, he's not burdened with that requirement on the terminal end. In that aspect, the more the driver can handle in terms of trailers or payload per day or week, the more productive he is to the shipping company. If the company is wasting the driver's high demand skills by having him load and unload cargo while other trailers are just sitting there waiting for a driver to take them where they need to go, then the company is wasting their own assets. I just wonder how much of this truck driver shortage is being caused by these high demand drivers being forced to do something other than driving, something that is better done by lesser skilled labor? Labor tends to be more productive when it is divided into specifications rather than jack of all trades, at least in theory. The point is to provide enough work hours to make sure each labor division is getting the full 8 to 10 hours per day, and not just sitting around after the specific job have been met, while other work goes begging. If the work requirements are too small to justify labor divisions, then the dual job roles make more sense. greyhouds: Remember, it isn't the number of trailers so much as it is the total payload burdening the cab unit. I would bet the average 53' dry van trailer plying the Interstates weighs half of the average grain trailer plying the backroads of rural America. If you can keep the total GVW of two 53's under 150k, you should be okay in terms of what the rig can pull. In terms of handling, it's my understanding that the "b-train" combo design allows for better driver control than the drawbar pulled trailer design. It shouldn't be too hard to design a b-train combo for double 53's. In the future, if longer and/or higher GVW units are allowed, you might see the concept of the DPU used in trucking. Putting a cabless engine unit as the 5th wheel base between the first and second trailer, and remotely controlled by the cab unit, could have some of the same benefits for trucking as it does for railroads.
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