Shadow the Cats ownerWell this should tell you something about the tare weight issue. That Prime looked into reefer containers and decided that there was NO way that for their business model that they could make the tare weight issue work for them. The loss of almost 3 tons of cargo capacity was just to much for them to even consider even with the newest models able to carry 30 skids in them. The weight difference is just to much. When you can scale 5k more pounds with full tanks when hauling beef or produce you tend to make more money when your paid by the hundred weight.
Prime can make their own decisions about their own equipment. Other truckers with intermodal reefer operations have acquired the reefer containers. (KLLM, for example.)
Prime is apparently going with lightweight reefer trailers for intermodal. Fine with me. As long as they go intermodal.
A railroad can keep TOFC trailers competitive with its pricing policy. I know BNSF has done this at times.
Well this should tell you something about the tare weight issue. That Prime looked into reefer containers and decided that there was NO way that for their business model that they could make the tare weight issue work for them. The loss of almost 3 tons of cargo capacity was just to much for them to even consider even with the newest models able to carry 30 skids in them. The weight difference is just to much. When you can scale 5k more pounds with full tanks when hauling beef or produce you tend to make more money when your paid by the hundred weight.
Two points:
1. Obviously I was referring to above tare weight as the phrase "capacity/weight carried" clearly means.
2. If additional containers are need to carry the same given load than trailers, obviously that certainly influences the economics.
charlie hebdoIf Shadowcat is correct, the capacity/weight carried in trailers is considerably more than that of containers. This also figures into the economics.
Were the containers to be loaded to 'ship' standards, they would of course carry far more than any road-going or domestic container, and the usual ISO marine container is of course designed to that capability by standard. In my opinion it would be far easier to refit (or build new) railroad equipment capable of marine loading than to attempt to build road chassis (likely with multiple axles and sophisticated weight-sensing and accommodating suspension) to handle it -- and rely more on a break-bulk or cross-dock type of operating model at the various 'regional' intermodal points in the supply chain.
If Shadowcat is correct, the capacity/weight carried in trailers is considerably more than that of containers. This also figures into the economics.
BaltACDDoesn't seem like apples and apples are being measured.
The chief difference is in the oversight, and consequent control, of the "dispatching" of the load-carrying equipment -- for these purposes it is almost immaterial if they are trailers or containers. Admittedly STCO's equipment is often purpose-built and probably of expensive construction with expensive maintenance, so there's more of an incentive to minimize dwell and maximize turns. But outside the time actually spent moving in consists, the handling of truck-line-owned boxes is little different from handling of trailers, with only the consideration of 'chassis management' complicating it -- and this kind of consideration is well-understood with respect to other intermodal efforts from Flexi-Van through the 'second iteration' of RoadRailer with articulated three-piece trucks to the present.
Reading between the lines, the relatively long turns may be perceived as 'adequate' by the operators -- there are certainly ways, some of them very simple and cost-effective to implement, to reduce that time. I'm quite sure there are people at the various companies at least as knowledgeable, and perhaps disinclined to lay out their reasoning in a competitive environment, which may be a strong indication to study the actual service to see where speed is needed vs. where it costs more than it contributes.
As we get further into the supposed game-changing alternative-power autonomously-enabled future, we can expect both the market and the economics to change, at which point I'd certainly anticipate the railroads' part in the exercise to b 'streamlined' where they deem practical. It would certainly be fun to see at least one of the big operators heavily invested in box traffic, like J.B. Hunt, test some of the methods earlier.
charlie hebdo Shadow the Cats owner I know that our trailers on average 4 loads or more a month based on logbook records. That is for our van side our tanker side is closer to 6 loads a month for the acid boys and our peumatics are around 4 to 5 loads a month also. Our tank division is a shorter distance hauled normally 800 miles or less and unless we have a tank wash in the area they come back empty. You are doing 12+ loads per quarter while the other guys' calculation was 5.31 loads. It doesn't seem like they are competitive.
Shadow the Cats owner I know that our trailers on average 4 loads or more a month based on logbook records. That is for our van side our tanker side is closer to 6 loads a month for the acid boys and our peumatics are around 4 to 5 loads a month also. Our tank division is a shorter distance hauled normally 800 miles or less and unless we have a tank wash in the area they come back empty.
I know that our trailers on average 4 loads or more a month based on logbook records. That is for our van side our tanker side is closer to 6 loads a month for the acid boys and our peumatics are around 4 to 5 loads a month also. Our tank division is a shorter distance hauled normally 800 miles or less and unless we have a tank wash in the area they come back empty.
You are doing 12+ loads per quarter while the other guys' calculation was 5.31 loads. It doesn't seem like they are competitive.
Doesn't seem like apples and apples are being measured.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
MP173a key metric was the intermodal loads - 524906 during 4Q, 2020. Quite impressive. However, it took JBH 98689 containers to move those loads....an average of 5.31 loads per quarter, or one load every 16.9 days (based on a 90 day quarter). Break down the info a bit more (trusty slide rule at my side) and that is $140 per day revenue for each container. That is not very much. Consider that the JBH intermodal is in very concentrated lanes and their average length of haul is 1711 miles with average revenue per load at $2360 ($1.38 per mile for those of you wondering). The mileage from LA to KC is roughly 1700 when drayage is considered...perhaps a bit more. Five and a fraction loads per quarter for a container moving in highly concentrated lanes 1700 miles does not seem very efficient to me. Or am I overlooking something?
MP173 Good point BALT...but there seems to be a trend for more and more 24/7 shipping/receiving, particularly by the large DCs. With the reduction of quarterly data from 90 days to 65 days (13 weeks * 5 days per week) one still has a load factor of every 12 days....based on an average haul of 1711 miles. Not very efficient. It would be interesting to go behind the scenes of JBH, Hub, Schneider, and others to see how these truckload carriers actually operate. Ed
Good point BALT...but there seems to be a trend for more and more 24/7 shipping/receiving, particularly by the large DCs. With the reduction of quarterly data from 90 days to 65 days (13 weeks * 5 days per week) one still has a load factor of every 12 days....based on an average haul of 1711 miles. Not very efficient.
It would be interesting to go behind the scenes of JBH, Hub, Schneider, and others to see how these truckload carriers actually operate.
Ed
Part of the slow cycle time could very well be chassis availability.
MP173Back to hauling meat from Iowa... I woke up this morning and suddening realized why this has not been implemented, or at least in my simple mind. Earlier this week thru the wonders of a news feed on my phone a quarterly earnings report from JBHunt was featured. I read it (yes I actually read financial statements...that is how uneventful my life is) and a key metric was the intermodal loads - 524906 during 4Q, 2020. Quite impressive. However, it took JBH 98689 containers to move those loads....an average of 5.31 loads per quarter, or one load every 16.9 days (based on a 90 day quarter). Break down the info a bit more (trusty slide rule at my side) and that is $140 per day revenue for each container. That is not very much. Consider that the JBH intermodal is in very concentrated lanes and their average length of haul is 1711 miles with average revenue per load at $2360 ($1.38 per mile for those of you wondering). The mileage from LA to KC is roughly 1700 when drayage is considered...perhaps a bit more. Five and a fraction loads per quarter for a container moving in highly concentrated lanes 1700 miles does not seem very efficient to me. Or am I overlooking something?Cats...what is the efficiency of your trucking operation? How many loads are you turning with a trailer each quarter? Greyhound...how would you bend the cost curve to allow this Iowa Meat Express (IMX) to work? I havent even went down the rabbit hole as far as container costs and refer container costs are concerned, but $140 per day of revenue/dry van container doesnt seem very rich to me. Comments?One final thought...EHH has been hated for the PSR, but one of the key components was the reduction of assets thru more efficient usage. Perhaps there is a need, based on JBH's financials for a PSIntermodal (PSI). That asset usage is very leaky. Ed
I woke up this morning and suddening realized why this has not been implemented, or at least in my simple mind.
Earlier this week thru the wonders of a news feed on my phone a quarterly earnings report from JBHunt was featured. I read it (yes I actually read financial statements...that is how uneventful my life is) and a key metric was the intermodal loads - 524906 during 4Q, 2020. Quite impressive. However, it took JBH 98689 containers to move those loads....an average of 5.31 loads per quarter, or one load every 16.9 days (based on a 90 day quarter).
Break down the info a bit more (trusty slide rule at my side) and that is $140 per day revenue for each container. That is not very much.
Consider that the JBH intermodal is in very concentrated lanes and their average length of haul is 1711 miles with average revenue per load at $2360 ($1.38 per mile for those of you wondering). The mileage from LA to KC is roughly 1700 when drayage is considered...perhaps a bit more.
Five and a fraction loads per quarter for a container moving in highly concentrated lanes 1700 miles does not seem very efficient to me. Or am I overlooking something?Cats...what is the efficiency of your trucking operation? How many loads are you turning with a trailer each quarter?
Greyhound...how would you bend the cost curve to allow this Iowa Meat Express (IMX) to work?
I havent even went down the rabbit hole as far as container costs and refer container costs are concerned, but $140 per day of revenue/dry van container doesnt seem very rich to me.
Comments?One final thought...EHH has been hated for the PSR, but one of the key components was the reduction of assets thru more efficient usage. Perhaps there is a need, based on JBH's financials for a PSIntermodal (PSI). That asset usage is very leaky.
One element that is routinely overlooked in equipment utilization - weekends. Many (most) businesses don't work weekend. A load that arrives after close of business on Friday won't be handled until start of business on Monday, at the earliest.
Secondly, containers are not necessarily handled 'immediately' upon arrival for either loading or unloaded. I have no idea what JBH's rules are for 'free time' on their equipment with their customers are; 'free time' is something that is built into all haulage to allow for expeditious loading/unloading of the container.
SD60MAC9500 Regardless of how you feel about him. Hunter Harrison made the right call to change the dynamic of NWOH.
Regardless of how you feel about him. Hunter Harrison made the right call to change the dynamic of NWOH.
He didn't. Which is one of the reasons why after his death, NWOH went back to operating much closer to its original purpose.
An "expensive model collector"
Back to hauling meat from Iowa...
charlie hebdoIt appears OM's notion never made it to production, if that.
CSSHEGEWISCH Sounds like loading and unloading containers with grain uses a similar technique to that used with boxcars in years gone by. It probably includes a similar amount of leakage while in transit.
Sounds like loading and unloading containers with grain uses a similar technique to that used with boxcars in years gone by. It probably includes a similar amount of leakage while in transit.
Also labor intensive, probably. It appears OM's notion never made it to production, if that.
For 'ag-in-a-box' seasonal intermodal, I developed the GrainTainer, which was basically a folding frame with membrane container which could be collapsed vertically and locked for storage or empty handling. This was designed to be accessible by forks from below, spreaders from above, and some systems of sideloading, with the idea that 5 or more 'folded' could fit in the space on a rack flat occupied by a single ISO (I admit I designed for series 3, not series 1) container. Folded containers could be stored, or handled 'asynchronously' on single flats or small blocks, to return them for 'reloading' as necessary. I had them set up to be loaded at the top, with multiple internal 'cells', much like covered hoppers; there are a number of possibilities for emptying them although 'end doors' are not a good mechanical solution -- you would be amused by a couple of the options.
This was in the '70s, in the Fuel Foiler years, when sideloading into 'kangaroo pockets' was the coming thing for fast oil-saving TOFC and there was still a perceived benefit in COFC (as for Flexi-Van) in lower wind resistance. While it's possible that collapsible units could be built to be stack-loaded, much of the effectiveness of the design, particularly with regard to a number of types of service failure, would be compromised if strengthened to allow that... this includes ground-handling. Of course you would never allow this construction on a ship .
As a means of extracting grain from multiple loading points and converging it effectively and 'as quickly as cost-effectively desired' on bulk loading locations, it was, and I think it still remains, an interesting alternative. In the West, where the 'jumping-off place' for most prospective grain shipments is now, the transition to 'bulk' is not as amenable to river/waterway loading as traffic toward the Mississippi or some of the logical eastern-port destinations.
BaltACD If grain in containers is to be a 'thing'. Surprised that Covered Hopper style containers have not been developed.
Santa Fe experimented with just that back in the early 80's it was a part of their fuel foiler intermodal line.. The goal was to move goods to the Midwest loading the containers with grain for the return move to the West Coast. They were called A-Stacks and proved to be inefficient and cumbersome.
BaltACDIf grain in containers is to be a 'thing'. Surprised that Covered Hopper style containers have not been developed.
I would opine that the ease of moving containers (including tipping for loading and unloading) would preclude the complexity of making them operate like a hopper car.
Such tipping is already done.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
dpeltier MP173 Which leads to the next questions, why hasnt a system been developed to load all those MT international containers with grain going to China? Shouldnt be too difficult to figure that out. Ed For corn or wheat you're never going to match the efficiency of a unit train. But for some products that are generated in smaller volumes or that are more differentiated, that would otherwise move as carload freight in manifest service, "ag-in-a-box" is a real thing. I know of two ways in which ag-in-a-box products are shipped to the west coast. The first is on regular intermodal trains. As with all such moves, it works best if the trip origin is close to the rail terminal. The other way is that some companies have opened what are basically unit train facilities, except with well cars in place of hoppers. The railroad delivers a trainload of empty containers, the customer has a certain amount of time to deramp and load the cars up with loaded containers, and the train departs. A relatively new service of this type recently opened in Minot, ND for pulses and other specialty crops being exported through the PNW, but it is not the first. Individually the products do not generate whole trainloads to a single destination, but collectively they do. The key feature for anything that uses intermodal equipment is just that there has to be a large number of containers moving from one terminal to another. With carload you can sort cars into blocks in a classification terminal; with intermodal, they are loaded into blocks at the originating rail terminal. As I understand it, North Baltimore was an experiment in trying to create the functional equivalent of a classification yard for containers, so that intermodal could operate as a network instead of a fixed and limited set of O/D pairs. Apparently it was not considered a success. Given the massive investment required, don't expect anyone else to rush to try again for a while. If you want to open a rail intermodal terminal, you'll have to show that you can aggregate a large number of trips - probably a train's worth, in most cases - from your new terminal to a single destination terminal. Dan
MP173 Which leads to the next questions, why hasnt a system been developed to load all those MT international containers with grain going to China? Shouldnt be too difficult to figure that out. Ed
Which leads to the next questions, why hasnt a system been developed to load all those MT international containers with grain going to China? Shouldnt be too difficult to figure that out.
For corn or wheat you're never going to match the efficiency of a unit train. But for some products that are generated in smaller volumes or that are more differentiated, that would otherwise move as carload freight in manifest service, "ag-in-a-box" is a real thing.
I know of two ways in which ag-in-a-box products are shipped to the west coast.
The first is on regular intermodal trains. As with all such moves, it works best if the trip origin is close to the rail terminal.
The other way is that some companies have opened what are basically unit train facilities, except with well cars in place of hoppers. The railroad delivers a trainload of empty containers, the customer has a certain amount of time to deramp and load the cars up with loaded containers, and the train departs. A relatively new service of this type recently opened in Minot, ND for pulses and other specialty crops being exported through the PNW, but it is not the first. Individually the products do not generate whole trainloads to a single destination, but collectively they do.
The key feature for anything that uses intermodal equipment is just that there has to be a large number of containers moving from one terminal to another. With carload you can sort cars into blocks in a classification terminal; with intermodal, they are loaded into blocks at the originating rail terminal.
As I understand it, North Baltimore was an experiment in trying to create the functional equivalent of a classification yard for containers, so that intermodal could operate as a network instead of a fixed and limited set of O/D pairs. Apparently it was not considered a success. Given the massive investment required, don't expect anyone else to rush to try again for a while. If you want to open a rail intermodal terminal, you'll have to show that you can aggregate a large number of trips - probably a train's worth, in most cases - from your new terminal to a single destination terminal.
Dan
If grain in containers is to be a 'thing'. Surprised that Covered Hopper style containers have not been developed.
UP sad to say right now could really care less about more business. They still are in the throes of PSR and to hell with growing business right now. A company could offer them a million dollars a day contract that required local switching and UP more than likely would say no. If you look at their intermodal trains they do have anything but 3rd party logistics and maybe a few England containers. Then look at BNSF they're getting everything else. When SWIFT refuses to even consider the UP for intermodal you're in a problem. England uses them since well they don't have much choice in Salt Lake City.
MP173 Which leads to the next questions, why hasnt a system been developed to load all those MT international containers with grain going to China? Shouldnt be too difficult to figure that out.
That's already happening. But it adds additional handling costs compared to bulk shipment of grain.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
Must have been some very potent PSR kool-aid they were drinking to turndown grain trains to the coast. You build the rate to cover the return MTs.
greyhounds Overmod What would be interesting would be Z-train speed with dedicated blocks of reefers handled in consist, something that I'd think ought to be technically possible, The UP has actually done that. Tropicana reefer cars were modified to be able to operate at 70 MPH. They took orange juice from Floirida to California and were handled in 70 MPH intermodal trains.
Overmod What would be interesting would be Z-train speed with dedicated blocks of reefers handled in consist, something that I'd think ought to be technically possible,
The UP has actually done that. Tropicana reefer cars were modified to be able to operate at 70 MPH. They took orange juice from Floirida to California and were handled in 70 MPH intermodal trains.
As does BNSF.. BNSF does not run unit reefer trains. They run reefer blocks for the most part in their z-train network.
greyhounds Overmod What would be interesting would be Z-train speed with dedicated blocks of reefers handled in consist, something that I'd think ought to be technically possible, The UP has actually done that. Tropicana reefer cars were modified to be able to operate at 70 MPH. The took orange juice from Floirida to California and were handled in 70 MPH intermodal trains.
The UP has actually done that. Tropicana reefer cars were modified to be able to operate at 70 MPH. The took orange juice from Floirida to California and were handled in 70 MPH intermodal trains.
I don't know if they had to do much modification. All reefers and auto racks are allowed 70 mph on the UP.
That being said, other restrictions like Tons per Operative Brake can reduce a 70 mph train to 60 or 50 MPH.
Jeff
One of the tennants of PSR is to run a balanced network. Run the same number of trains in each direction. If there are 5 eastbounds and 6 westbounds, divide the traffic in that 6th train into the remaining 5. (Or run off enough business so you only need 5 trains.) Then retire (store, sell, furlough) any excess assests not needed to run the "balanced" network. Only retain enough assests to run the balanced network, not allowing for any possible upticks in business.
Unit trains, especially the low frequency users) throws off the balance. The idea is to move that low volume traffic into the manifest network. Instead of waiting 10 days for a 100 car train, work the industry more often and move the smaller blocks in manifest trains. That way extra equipment and manpower doesn't have to be retained for the unit train.
From what I read elsewhere, that's what got Vena and some of the other PSR types removed/reassigned. The Chinese were/are buying US grain due to their own ag problems. UP was looking at a 50% increase in grain trains to the west coast/PNW. Vena didn't want to do it because it would throw off his balanced network. Others on the board started askng why we have all these assests in storage instead of out producing revenue. Throw in the rising customer complaints, which I imagine are becoming harder to hide or explain away, the possible change of who's in the driver's seat and you have the possibility of them pulling back from the heavy, gung-ho PSR.
Every other railroad that has gone all out for PSR has eventually reached that point. They don't pull away completely from all tennants of PSR, but they've cut and gutted to the point they can't cut any more. They need to grow business. UP may have reached that point.
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