Apipe dream.
1. The investment in the palletts would be enormous. If a pallet is not available when the truck is, the whole system has failed. A pallet would cost very near what a dry van would.
2. We already have an intermodal system that is working well. UPS,YRT, Schneider, J.B. Hunt and many others use it every day. Introducing a different system makes about as much sense as a different track gauge.
3.European hauls are short. Switzerland has a similar drive on system to avoid 1 tunnel. Our system is oriented to longer hauls.
4. The fact that there trailers are not intermodal compatible is moot the like of the trailer is short enough that 10 years would effect the majority of the changover. If a trailer is not compatible then it will sustain damage to equipment and contents.
This looks like a variation of Iron Highway and other systems designed to allow un-reinforced trailers to be used in TOFC service. One disadvantage that I see immediately is that the system loads the trailers onto pallets which would in turn be loaded on spine cars, a lot of capital would be tied up in making sure that there are enough pallets available. Nothing seems to be mentioned about tiedowns for the trailer onto the pallet.
I would like to see this technology implemented here in the United States.
I totally support this because:
Parking, Hours of Service, Weather situations at mountain passes, reductions in driver time on the road, more home time and so on so forth.
If drivers had these things in every little city and mountain passes or interstate choked gridlock prone areas, these trains can bypass all of that and save the headache.
I can see myself taking a trailer out of Jonesboro Arkansas with a load of Tools for California and when reaching say... The Oklahoma Line, I can drop off said trailer and see it go away, pick up a empty or loaded trailer bound for somewhere in Arkansas or even bridge it to Memphis or something, and drop that trailer off and grab an empty and take it home for the night.
If everything works out well. I can probably still turn in 400+ miles per day in state and be pretty close to home. I still need that sleeper in case something came up.
I can see the North East Cities or Chicago using this. If a driver is new out of school, they are not yet... ready for such loads and can haul it to say... McLean Illinois and put it on rail there somewhat close to Chicago and grab a load going somewhere else.
Then it would be up to a native of Chicago with his day cab or sleeper cab to grab this load and deliver it and pick up another.
Any way you can by pass or totally remove alot of things that stop wheels from turning on the choked highways means you are more mobile, free to run and consume less hours and have more time to take care of yourself and make nearly as much or more than you did before.
This is not to say that the days of 2000 mile hauls are over, Teams still do that very well. My wife and I can be in LA monday AM, in Jersey wed PM and back to LA by saturday morning legally and we have for weeks.
With this system we can probably just stick a LA load bound for jersey somewhere in Tennessee and return towards... Arizona or some such with a LA bound load and possibly speed up transit times.
Whoever designs and build these depots for transfers of trailer to rail and vice versa are going to find themselves in need of dedicated rails free from interference from other traffic and it is going to be a high volume, high pressure and extremely HOT, critical and stressful place with a lot going on.
It may make a place like Seagirt in Baltimore obselete. Yes they load a Intermodal train and ship it out but it takes time. Imagine if a cargo ship pulls in, throws a bunch of containers on chassis and day drivers slap them into a transfer place and it's gone out of Baltimore quick without rush hour traffic or other worries...
Who knows.
Chicago might simply make all those VERY large yards dedicated to Intermodal disappear and simply have a few beamer spots coming in from all over the usa with fleet of bob tail trucks ready to grab these loads and take em downtown.
Imagine for a minute that... 50 trailers show up on a train with two engines or so. They are unloaded within a half hour and reloaded within the hour and gone. The 50 trailers are also gone and everything will speed up.
Why send a driver on a 2000 mile run when you can just simply stick it and let the train take it.
Regarding mountain passes.
Some drivers are not allowed to run I-70 in winter because they have no experience yet. Yet we can send a bunch to Denver Colorado, have them transfer to train there, train goes to Grand Junction in a few hours and the trailers continue on thier way regardless of the weather conditions on I-70
What about Hunt's Point. NYC. You can have a train show up with a bunch of reefers loaded with food at 2 am and be unloaded and gone by sunrise. No more worrying about having drivers fighting traffic each midnight from New Jersey or Connecticut facing dangers to and from hunts point. And you will have more drivers willing to take loads in that direction instead of refusing them.
owner operators can probably buy a bunch of trailers. Load them in Little Rock or whatever, corral them on such a beamer transfer make these loads go wherever they are going and bring in inbound loads to deliver. I am not sure what the freight rates are for drayage work but it will be less stress on the Owner Operator except wondering where "His" fleet of trailers are and when etc.
I can go on. But I would prefer sometimes to make allowances on a train for at least a FEW complete rigs to drive onto the flat car and the driver simply go into sleeper while train rolls on. After the night's sleep or day's sleep is finished, single can drive off at the nearest beamer and continue his road trip.
No more worries about lot lizards, theives, scammers or any usualy trouble makers at night in the less safe places to park when the usual legal places are all full as they are every night.
And the best savings of all? If you are facing end of hours, you are tired and driving badly risking your life and those of others (Driving over tired is worse than driving drunk, I have done it way too many times....) and no parking spot in sight for at least two states and several hundred more miles... just hop onto a beamer and sleep as the train rolls on.
I like it.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,716654,00.html
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
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