What lies ahead for intermodal

Railway Age, April, 2005

"If railroads no longer can live with the 'we've-always-done-it-that-way' attitude ... then we who are railroad suppliers can't live with it either."

--Curtis D. Buford

Intermodal executives are looking beyond traditional strategies for future growth opportunities. A national shared chassis pool is just one of them. TTX could facilitate the implementation of such a pool, in response to the "growing likelihood" of private investment in domestic container fleets without the corresponding investment in chassis, according to UP's Kaiser. "With the infrastructure already in place, the key elements TTX could provide include a common means to track chassis movement nationally and the essential apparatus to balance chassis availability among contributing roads."

Another: New equipment R&D. "Are there opportunities in future railcar designs to move more containers in a given footage of train?" questions Schneider's Matheson. "In the TOFC space, spine cars were a great innovation 20 years ago, but we haven't seen a quantum leap since. Is there a step-level increase ha productivity that can be achieved there or is that well dry?"

In sum, intermodal's future depends on reliable service and satisfied customers. "We can't give up on the commitment we have to providing service quality," underscores Michael McClellan, Norfolk Southern's vice president-intermodal marketing. "It's a balancing act and precise investment is required. If we grow while providing high-quality product, the sky's the limit, and we'll meet that objective using TTX as our foundation."