Posted on 11/01/2021 10:02:48 AM PDT by Extremely Extreme Extremist
I have a simple question for every ‘expert’ who thinks they understand the root causes of the shipping crisis: Why is there only one crane for every 50–100 trucks at every port in America? No ‘expert’ will answer this question. I’m a Class A truck driver with experience in nearly every aspect of freight. My experience in the trucking industry of 20 years tells me that nothing is going to change in the shipping industry.
(Excerpt) Read more at medium.com ...
Opinions vary, I guess; I obviously liked it. So I critique your critique of my critique; thus it would appear we are at an impasse (unless, of course, you are channeling Dostoyevsky, in which case I’m at a disadvantage).
lol
Total BS. My post was spot on you globalist hack
This guy misses the mark, I think. The problem in California is liberal idiocy. The dem government made trucks that were manufactured prior to 2011 illegal. They made trucks themselves illegal by 2035. SURPRISE, truck shortage. Nobody wants to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars on a new truck that will be illegal in a short time.
Owner / operators have traditionally worked that port but California outlawed owner / operators as well. It’s a crisis of their own making and more and more I’m beginning to believe it’s not incompetence but being done deliberately. The managed decline of America.
Fixed it.
Funny thing on I-95 95% of the semi trucks I see are using standard semi trailers and not inter model boxes.
Factories in the USA ( yes global boy there are still a few left ) use standard semi trailers to ship to domestic warehouses all the USA.
The problem is we don’t make everything in the USA. Supply chains used to be hundreds of miles now there are thousands of miles long and much COMES FROM A HOSTILE COMMUNIST COUNTRY.
Sorta like Pelosi fighting with the Progressives...
Pro worker, anti union patriot here.
One thing that changed everything in the wholesale/retail relationships was the taxing of goods held on 1 January. Wholesale companies used to manufacture goods and sell them to retailers for at least a 100% markup. This allowed retailers to afford to maintain inventory, process returns, etc. Tax laws changed in the 1980’s. Companies are now taxed for any goods they hold on 1 January, so they desire to hold little to nothing at end of year.
Toss in the MBA programs teaching to get profits at all stages of the process and take everything today and forget about tomorrow, and the two make for a Just-In-Time sales pipeline that is fragile. Wholesale leaves retail no more than 20% markup margins and often just 3-5%. Retail cannot afford inventory due to cost and taxes.
Yes but that’s been the case for decades. And it’s only now causing supply chain problems? I agree that there should be more things made here, and I think that the current situation is created by democrat party policies.
Who off shored our vital industries? Republican Yuppie MBA POS’s.
Yes, factor that in and its a wonder anything works at all. Our government is stupid across all fronts.
+1
See my tagline.
Yes I agree. But again, that’s not why there are suddenly container ships that cannot offload.
No, it wasn't.
1. So let me get this straight ... Because 95% of the semi trucks you see on I-95 are using standard semi trailers instead of intermodal shipping containers, you're going to make a logical inference that this must mean all domestic truck freight is moved that way? I'm sorry, but that is completely wrong -- and I'll demonstrate it below.
2. The first flaw in your assessment is that you're using the wrong highway to make your case. I-95 is one of the busiest roadways in the country because it connects some of the nation's largest metro areas along the east coast. It is simply not economical for long-haul trucks to use this route unless they absolutely have to be there. The route is too congested, many stretches of the highway have tolls on it, and because it connects so many old cities the roadway geometry doesn't meet modern design standards. You're not even legally allowed to bring a 53-foot trailer into New York City on I-95 unless it is traveling to or from Long Island or JFK Airport.
2. The length of I-95 between the northernmost and southernmost cities (Boston and Miami) is almost exactly 1,500 miles. Go back to my previous comment about the length of a haul where intermodal rail service is more economical than a truck move (400-500 miles). Along a 1,500-mile length of roadway, there are only so many major origin-destination pairs where the volume of freight would be sufficient to justify intermodal train service. Contrast this with the major east-west highway routes that connect the U.S. east coast to the rest of North America, including I-90 (3,100 miles), I-80 (2,900 miles), I-40 (2,500 miles) and I-10 (2,450 miles). The east-west routes across North America are the ones where intermodal rail service can serve the most markets.
3. The north-south rail connections along the east coast of the U.S. are notoriously difficult for the intermodal rail business. The busiest CSX route along the I-95 corridor can't even accommodate double-stack intermodal trains unless they're loaded to specific height configurations. Some of these segments have only 18'-0" of vertical clearance. Others allow 19'-0". What this means is that -- depending on the route -- these intermodal trains can handle two 8'6" boxes, and some can handle an 8'6" and a 9'6" box, but none of them can handle two 9'6" containers stacked together on a rail car. Intermodal service simply isn't competitive in many areas when the railroad has to specialize its terminal loading operations like this.
4. What Items #1 through #3 mean is that most of the trucks traveling along I-95 are making either long-haul deliveries of very time-sensitive freight, or shorter-haul deliveries to the ultimate consumers in these major cities. Shipping containers (domestic OR international) are rarely used for this type of truck shipment. The next time you're out on I-95, do a rough count and see how many of these are refrigerated trailers. These are generally hauling very time-sensitive freight that would never get transloaded into a 53-foot intermodal shipping containers even for a 3,000+ mile trip across North America.
5. Shipping containers are almost always used for "intermediate" links in a supply chain, not for final deliveries. That's why it's common to see a major distribution center for Walmart or Amazon that has rows of intermodal trailers lined up on the "inbound" side of the building, but none of them lined up on the "outbound" side of the building. Walmart gets huge volumes of freight delivered to its distribution centers in domestic and international shipping containers, but it makes almost 100% of its deliveries to its local stores in standard tractor trailers. What this means is that your heaviest volumes of shipping containers will be seen around ports and intermodal rail yards, not traveling between cities along the major interstate highways.
You are obviously a professional Free Traitor. The worst of the worst. A paid hack perhaps...
LOL. This is so weak I can't even be angry at you.
The supposition that importing all of our durable goods from foreign sources is sustainable in the long term is ludicrous. Talking about how to move imported crap around is equally useless. It is like rearranging the chairs on the Titanic.
MAKE IT HERE. DO IT NOW. TARIFFS. THEN MORE TARIFFS.
Where did I say that importing all of our durable goods from foreign sources is (1) sustainable in the long term, or (2) desirable in any way whatsoever?
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