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Why do railroads run intermodal so fast?

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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by gabe Antigates, I am not saying your wrong. I am way to ignorant on this subject to make such a bombastic statement. However, it just seems to me that you are missing my premise. I know what you are saying about steamships not having to compete with truckers. But, what I am saying, is that is an irrelevant red herring. Futuremodal, Greyhounds, Oltmand, MP173, and others have given me good explanations that, at the very least, shed light on my conundrum. However, I still stick to my initial premise that--absent some of the other reasons referenced above--truck competition with steamships vel non, it makes absolutely no sense to me to pay a dollar more for freight to have it arive in one month and 4 hours instead of one month and 11 hours. It seems irrelevant to me that steamships aren't competing with trucks, all that really matters is the infintesible difference reflected in the bottom line. Gabe [/quote] Gosh Gabe, Now you are throwing in this last minute curve that the decision must be RATIONAL? It is people we are talking about right? [:D] Hey, if you prefer the reply's of Futuremodal, Greyhounds, Oltmand, MP173, (and others) over mine, then no one is twisting your arm to go with my speculation. In a perfect world you run your business perfectly. You make golden sales forcasts, and build and deplete inventory in perfect coordination with the perfectly targeted sales forcasts. But,..when you blow it,..and sales out strip your forcast by a sizable margin ...what do you do? You order more and chew nails until you have more salable product in your hands. The real point I was trying to make,..is that MAYBE if you are a Walmart...you represent sufficient volume that you can get the shipping companies to do backflips for you...set up a dedicated trans pacific flotilla, just to appease yout need. But, if your total annual volume is 100 containers,...and your current urgent need is for 10 of those.....do you really think the shipping company is even gonna CARE that you are in a hurry? And even if they did,....what could they really do about it? So, you wait... Now, if you are in a "hot channel" product line,..every day that you are out of stock on the item you await,...is a day that your customers find someone else to fill the need that you cannot. So, in this admittedly contrived (but by no means outlandish) set of circumstances...if the materials get to you in 31 days arriving at your dock at 10:00 Am in the morning ...you are in bettershape than if they can't arrive until 6 PM,.. after your loading dock crew has been home for 2 hours already... My revised short answer to you is "Time is money" regardless of how you slice it. They expected that Federal Express was going to be a catastrophic failure too. Assuming that no one in their right minds would be so impatient to pay such a premium for transportation. Never underestimate the capacity of mortal men to be vain where time is the concern. If you don't like that answer, well,,, so sorry
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