Dakguy201Perhaps a single refrigerated container that could operate from the Midwest to the Far East is a "bridge too far", regardless of how it goes to the west coast. Let's accept (at least for now) that transloading has to occur at the export point. However, I continue to believe there is profitable business to be had for the rails in the US portion of the haul. Tyson's plant in the Sioux City area has a daily kill capacity of 12,000 head of cattle. The majority of that meat is further processed into boxed beef before shipment, and the plant accepts beef from other Tyson plants to be converted to the boxes. In addition the Seaboard-Triumph joint venture has just completed a new pork plant at Sioux City with capacity of 11,000 head per shift. For now it is a one shift operation, but there are plans to add another at some point in the future. That is a whole lot of meat that leaves the area every day. The majority of it goes south then then east or west on I=80. Both plants are near rail mainlines -- the Tyson plant already has a mini-switchyard on the property. However, as a starting point if you dray the product 90 miles to Council Bluffs, you are on UP's Overland Route -- a straight shot to Oakland (1700 miles). Council Bluffs has a large underutilized UP switchyard, so creating a loading facility for TOFC or containers should be easy. The problem I haven't worked out in my mind is the backhaul, but all of those truckers must have the same problem.
12,000 head per day is a whole lot of dead cows. Off the top of my head I think that many would result in 40-50 truckloads just of cowhides per day before anybody even got around to hauling the beef. Sioux City is a center of red meat production with even more (much more) produced within economical drayage distance. The new hog plant opened last month and will ramp up to adding a 2nd shift next summer. Eventually, they plan to get to 20,000 hogs per day. The facility will employ around 2,000 new production workers.
Additionally, northwest Iowa produces about one of eight eggs in the US. Plus some turkey. Iowa and Nebraska are all about food production.
I’ve been through all this before. I’ll try to be brief.
The meat (and eggs) moves in large volumes on long hauls to coastal population centers such as Los Angeles and New York City. It overwhelmingly moves by truck although the railroads do get some of the export traffic. There is absolutely no, none, zero, nada valid economic reason for trucking to dominate the movement of this food. Yes, I’ve done the research/analysis and I’m qualified to do such research/analysis.
The Union Pacific is in the catbird’s seat on this. They do have an intermodal terminal in Council Bluffs. Unfortunately, their current management is focused on reducing their operating ratio to 55. (See the November, 2017 issue of Trains.) This is in lieu of pursuing profitable business opportunities. Other railroads, such as the CN and BNSF, also have good opportunities in meat and eggs. And they’re less obsessive compulsive about the OR.
There are several ways to successfully haul this traffic:
1) Use reefer boxcars in intermodal service with transloads from/to trucks. This is just another type of intermodal service. It does produce tremendous economics because each railcar can handle around 3 ½ truckloads.
2) Use standard highway trailers in TOFC service. You would actually be able to carry a greater payload than the over the road operations since you could use a light weight day cab tractor for the drayage.
3) Use domestic reefer containers.
4) Use international reefer containers for export moves. Contrary to what the cat’s owner says, these move just fine in rail service and are regularly used. They can use a domestic reefer unit with a 125 gallon fuel tank and can be serviced by any Thermo King dealer.
https://www.generatorjoe.net/html/thermo/sgco.pdf
Each method has advantages and disadvantages. There is no need for the railroads to limit themselves to any one of the four. They can all be used where appropriate.
Backhauls are not that much of a problem. There will be some empty, non revenue miles. That’s true of any freight. There isn’t a transportation system in the world that doesn’t have to move empty equipment around. Remember, a reefer can haul a dry load. The west coast loads will be quite easy to reload east. But most of the final moves in to Sioux City will be empties. There just isn’t that much freight going in to SC. An example would be meat from Sioux City to the Lathrop, CA intermodal terminal, produce from Lathrop to Chicago, empty back to Sioux City.
This can be done profitably. But that’s enough from me for now.
Perhaps a single refrigerated container that could operate from the Midwest to the Far East is a "bridge too far", regardless of how it goes to the west coast. Let's accept (at least for now) that transloading has to occur at the export point.
However, I continue to believe there is profitable business to be had for the rails in the US portion of the haul. Tyson's plant in the Sioux City area has a daily kill capacity of 12,000 head of cattle. The majority of that meat is further processed into boxed beef before shipment, and the plant accepts beef from other Tyson plants to be converted to the boxes.
In addition the Seaboard-Triumph joint venture has just completed a new pork plant at Sioux City with capacity of 11,000 head per shift. For now it is a one shift operation, but there are plans to add another at some point in the future.
That is a whole lot of meat that leaves the area every day. The majority of it goes south then then east or west on I=80.
Both plants are near rail mainlines -- the Tyson plant already has a mini-switchyard on the property. However, as a starting point if you dray the product 90 miles to Council Bluffs, you are on UP's Overland Route -- a straight shot to Oakland (1700 miles). Council Bluffs has a large underutilized UP switchyard, so creating a loading facility for TOFC or containers should be easy.
The problem I haven't worked out in my mind is the backhaul, but all of those truckers must have the same problem.
Dak look where the plants are located for meat packing places like Liberal KS scattered across NE IA. The closest IM yards are hundreds of miles from those places on a routine basis. The drayage costs alone would be killer. Then you have the tare weight issue of the container chassis combo. A good speced out reefer carrier can carry almost 46K of product. If your using a container your giving away almost 2 tons of cargo. Next you can custom mix at your transload warehouse differnt cuts for a different customer across the ocean. Most reefer containers that are electric powered their powerpacks have a limited fuel source around 20 gallons on the chassis. A normal fuel tank on a trailer for a reefer is between 50-100 gallons. Next is if the unit breaks down most Thermo King dealers do not know how to repair the Marine aka Container based units. You give them the diesel powered ones they can get you up and running easily.
Just an observation from someone in the OTR industry whose boss is getting ready to buy a couple reefer trailers. So I am studying up on what we are in for and not liking it at all.
I don't really understand why a seperate point is needed to transfer the meat from the car or container loaded at the meatpacking facility to a ship capable container. I believe that for a number of reasons the shipping borne containers are electrically cooled, but I would not think that a dual energy source unit would be that more expensive to build and operate.
As Greyhounds is fond of pointing out, hundreds of meat trailers leave my area daily for the West Coast. Perhaps the main purpose of this facility is transloading highway trailers instead; the drawing certainly makes it appear so.
Nifty!
http://www.rtands.com/index.php/freight/yards-terminals/port-of-oakland-looking-to-beef%E2%80%9D-up-rail-infrastructure.html?channel=277
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