Keep in mind that the opening of the U.S. border to Mexican truckers is not a blanket, open-ended relaxation of cross-border trucking rules. The proposed USDOT initiative restricts this "open access" to only a select number of large Mexican fleets -- which basically protects the large U.S. trucking fleets from competition from small Mexican outfits while at the same time giving these large U.S. companies the opportunity to cut deals with the large Mexican fleets. You're probably going to see major U.S. firms like Schneider and J.B. Hunt signing agreements with these Mexican carriers that are similar to the deals U.S. airlines sign with foreign airlines to improve the efficiency of international travel. If you buy an airline ticket from United Airlines to fly between the U.S. and Canada, you pay United for the ticket and carry a United ticket to the gate, but you may end up flying an Air Canada aircraft on one leg of the trip.
The figures you are quoting are out of context for the entire of the American Trucking Industry. If one were to include local O/O’s that operate short haul perhaps you could achieve the figure of 80%-90% you are stating in your response.
My figures are probably reasonably accurate. Keep in mind that many of the trucks that operate in the large U.S. fleets are actually driven by owner-operators who sign contracts with these companies. When you pass an orange Schneider truck on the highway somewhere, you aren't necessarily passing a truck that is being driven by a Schneider employee.
Don’t forget it won’t be long and the Ports in our Nation will be empty of ships due that now Mexican trucks are allowed to invade our Sovereignty, the International Shipping Community will shift to Mexico to take advantage of the cheaper Port rates, cheaper Longshore, and trucking that is uninhibited by U.S. Environmental and Safety requirements.
You might be right, but I predict that it will be at least 200 years before this happens. The biggest problem this country faces in terms of its ports is that we import so much crap from all over Asia that all of our West Coast ports are operating at or near their capacity right now. There aren't enough ports on the Pacific coast of North and South America (combined) to handle the projected volume of U.S. imports over the next 20 years.
“You’re probably going to see major U.S. firms like Schneider and J.B. Hunt signing agreements with these Mexican carriers...”
Been going on in the industry for years already. It’s called “Logistics”.
“My figures are probably reasonably accurate. Keep in mind that many of the trucks that operate in the large U.S. fleets are actually driven by owner-operators who sign contracts with these companies.”
I had all that in mind when I responded that your figures are out of context. I’ve been involved in the Transportation Industry since 1968 and am semi retired at this time. I was involved at the beginning of International Ocean Cargo Container Shipping in my former years, and Truck Transportation and Containers in my latter years. I would hope I learned something about the Industry during those years.
“You might be right, but I predict that it will be at least 200 years before this happens.”
Alberta...(Shaking head) I disagree with your time line prediction as I was involved in many a meeting with the Principals of the International Container Ship Operators going back as early as 1970. The only reason the International Shipping Community hasn’t moved to Mexico is because of transportation out of Mexico. Now with the opening of our borders to Mexican trucks, this action by the International Shipping Community will happen very soon. Perhaps not en masse, but substantially enough to hurt our economy in various American Port cities.