Jacksonville, Fla.-primarily based CSX told analysts lately that of the 14 million truckloads that usually move within the Jap United States each year, about 5.1 million have already been transformed to intermodal, leaving a possible market of someweye bolt round 9 million. CSX said it handles about forty % of the 5.1 million hundreds which have already been converted.
Senior rail executives recognize the potential bonanza that awaits them ought to they persuade shippers that they'll ship on their intermodal service commitments and proceed to take action at lower charges than truckload. "We've a unique alternative, and the opportunity is large," says Steve Branscum, BNSF's group vice president, client products marketing.
To capitalize on this chance, the rails are building out their intermodal networks. Norfolk Southern's "Crescent Corridor," a 2,500-mile joint public-personal mission linking New Jersey with Louisiana, is predicted to divert 1 million vehicles per year from 10 interstate highways when the work is completed in 2013. Executives for the Norfolk, Va.-based mostly railroad had been unavailable for comment.
Earlier pipe clamp12 months, CSX opened an intermodal facility within the Northwest Ohio town of North Baltimore. The ability serves as the pivot of a hub-and-spoke operation the place freight arriving from nationwide factors is transferred to double-stack trains for supply all through the East. It allows shippers to bypass the infamous "choke point" of Chicago, and thus can scale back transit times by as much as two days between West Coast ports and distribution facilities within the Ohio Valley, CSX officials say.
At present metal center construction has entered the corporate