Drayage

Tightening Chicago drayage capacity is causing rates to spike, as shippers have little choice but to pay for more local trucking to avoid demurrage charges that railroads impose if loads aren’t removed from terminals after two days.

The hottest market for drayage this week may not be Los Angeles or Long Beach but New York and New Jersey, where shippers and brokers are scrambling to find power to move containers and trucks are backing up in long lines outside some New York-New Jersey port terminals.

The legal wrangling over the classification of drayage company drivers as being either employees or independent contractors has been going strong for 10 years now, yet closure could still be many years off.

The key to making the Cargomatic free-flow program work is to have enough BCO partners to generate a sizable block of containers each day to keep the equipment operator or operators busy, Mark Wheeler, general manager at WBCT, told a workshop at this week's TPM Conference in Long Beach.

A union representing about 400 harbor truckers serving Port Metro Vancouver is calling on the recently tapped head of the new drayage commission, tasked with setting minimum rates and governing licenses, to step down.

Drayage drivers serving the port of Manila warn that new rules requiring the phase-out of older trucks will cause congestion to rear its head again at the Philippines’ largest container port.

Shippers could see truck pricing 'skyrocket' as they scramble to move containers inland once the labor situation at U.S. West Coast ports is resolved, BB&T Capital Markets said.

An independent Australian government tribunal will consider whether to set new work rules or pay standards for the nation's drayage drivers, as well as other truckers, in 2015.

The Port of Virginia has begun posting weekly statistics for truck turn times and container dwell times at its terminals, something drayage operators have been clamoring for at other U.S. ports.

Drayage companies that are considering filing legal challenges to ocean carrier-imposed fees for the late return of equipment under the Uniform Intermodal Interchange Agreement should have confidence that their cases will be heard and arbitrated fairly, executive with the American Trucking Associations said.

Dozens of harbor truckers in Southern California notified the Uniform Intermodal Interchange Agreement, as well as a number of shipping lines, that because of the severe port congestion and labor disputes on the West Coast, they will not be held responsible for paying carrier-imposed charges for the late return of equipment.

Expedited business is up 10 percent year-over-year at regional Western trucking company Reddaway, thanks in part to extreme delays at West Coast ports.

Trucks entering Virginia’s Norfolk International Terminals will face new restrictions next month on when they can pull in with export-bound containers, a spokesman for the Virginia Port Authority has confirmed.

The British Columbia government's pick to oversee the new drayage program for Port Metro Vancouver has spurred a union driver backlash.

The annualized driver turnover rate at large truckload carriers rose to 97 percent in the third quarter, despite the efforts of some carriers to keep drivers by raising pay.

Port Metro Vancouver’s new trucker licensing system took effect Sunday despite continuing protests from some 600 drivers who weren’t certified to operate at Canada’s largest container port.

When it comes to whether Port Metro Vancouver will experience a crippling drayage strike like it did last March, the ball is in union and non-union drivers’ court.

The exclusion of roughly 600 drayage drivers from Port Metro Vancouver’s new licensing system has raised tensions here in what is increasingly looking like a showdown between truck drivers and the government.

Congestion and delays at U.S. West Coast ports meant UPS had to scramble to get containerized goods into its inland delivery network and to customers. Higher purchased transportation costs were a factor in lower fourth-quarter earnings.

APM Terminals-operated Gateway Terminals India closed its gates Sunday after truck drivers protesting intermittent gate closings at the facility violently clashed with police at the Nhave Sheva port complex.

Union and non-union drayage drivers serving Port Metro Vancouver will likely strike at Canada’s largest container port as soon as Feb. 1 if the provincial government doesn’t meet their demands.

Representatives of union and non-union drayage drivers serving Port Metro Vancouver will meet with British Columbia’s minister of transportation on Thursday in what drivers call a final attempt to avoid another strike at Canada’s largest container port.

New York-New Jersey port truckers say chassis shortages and dislocations have continued into 2015 while industry officials work to develop a portwide pool of interchangeable “gray” chassis by mid-year.

Drayage companies are pressing their fight with New York-New Jersey marine terminals over a tariff change that allows terminals to refuse to compensate truckers for waiting time caused by late ships or other reasons beyond motor carriers’ control.

A fast-growing intermodal operator, ASF opened its 11th terminal, a drayage facility, as it looks to capture more Southeastern U.S. freight.

The Port of Virginia will delay the launch of a truck appointment system at Norfolk International Terminals until this spring.

Dennis Morgan is taking the wheel as president of Cowan Systems, an evolving dedicated truckload and drayage carrier with trucking roots reaching back to the 1920s.

Container terminals in the Port of New York and New Jersey will close on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day but will be open for regular hours on Friday, Dec. 26.

U.S. intermodal trains on average are moving faster, but they still have a ways to go before delivering the level of service shippers had come to expect before last winter.

The likelihood that truck drivers will have different hours of service rules next year is increasing, as Congress wraps language that will change suspend some 2013 HOS changes into its $1 trillion spending bill.

The U.S. trucking industry is committing to hire 100,000 military veterans over the next two years to fight a shortage of truck drivers as the military begins to reduce the number of active service members.

Port Metro Vancouver is putting the finishing touches on the first drayage program in North America that will seek to balance truck capacity with demand in order to promote profitable operations for motor carriers and a sustainable wage level for drivers.

For the fourth straight week, JOC.com readers were voracious for LA-LB congestion coverage, but as port woes continue, delays on the West Coast are beginning to trickle down the supply chain. Nine of JOC's top 10 stories for the week concerned port congestion, with the exception one story on the Nicaragua canal.

Shippers face another round of woes even after their stalled containers move from congested Los Angeles-Long Beach via intermodal rail to Chicago.

Increasing container dwell times are taking a toll at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, further exacerbating congestion at the busiest U.S. port complex.

U.S. shippers dependent on congested ports face a tough year ahead, FTR Associates says. But that doesn't mean 2015 will be easy — or cheap — for anyone shipping freight in the U.S.

West Coast port congestion keeps spot market truck prices on inland routes high, and shippers are rethinking supply chains as cost rise.

Recent case law involving the independent contractor model in trucking indicates that companies must cover all bases in order to convince the courts and government agencies that owner-operator drivers are not direct employees, a Southern California attorney told the Harbor Transportation Club this week.

Truckers are complaining about a tariff change that restricts their ability to collect detention payments for excessive wait times and subjects them to $50 fees for avoidable trouble-window visits at most Port of New York and New Jersey container terminals.