Megas and O/O need to watch this - we could all be screwed. Rail is already taking a ton of freight.

Look it isn't time to panic, he may be a president in his dreams or maybe one day but he has to answer to congress and can't just say to the world "I want more rail here and there". It isn't like Czar Nicholas who just drew a line on a map and said "rail here ... now go away and build it".

Freight is down in some parts of the country, we are seeing a possible recession start up again and there is a shift in attitudes. Where I work we are slow, we are temp drivers and I am working four days a week because my customers are not moving dies for the auto companies which indicates problems - they are at the head of the proverbial production line, prototypes.

So I don't see rail happening any time soon, especially when we are not even in the election - this is the primary and voting doesn't count as people think it does. The parties will pick their candidates and we will have a real election, sanders won't win even if he gets to be the nominee.

 

What I wanna know is who let him out of the Nursing home?

 

Recession??
But, but that's impossible. ..the government has been telling us that economy is doing just fine. ..

 

All the political talk right now is just a bunch of meaningless bluster. These people will say anything to sway some votes. It isn't even remotely logical or possible what he is claiming. Yeah rails have lost coal and they are picking off a lot more of long haul freight but that has been the normal trend anyways. They have almost completed dual tracks between LA and Chicago which will definitely put a much larger dent in long haul dry van, reefer, and flat. But again rail just will never be able to compete on the less than 500 miles segment which is where all of you solo operators should be working anyways to maximize your profitability.

 

The gov and media in MN has people scared of trains. They make them out to be rolling fireballs just waiting to level small towns. A couple of local towns are making quiet zones which seems a--backwards to me. Winona MN had 3 peds killed by trains in 6 weeks, I have no idea how that can happen. When a CHS propane truck was hit by a train the gov said we need more money for rail safety. Even if the signals were not working and the engineer was sleeping the semi should have stopped and looked both ways before crossing, not really the trains fault. Trucks will always be needed people just don't want to admit that their soy latte mix, Lexus, Bombshell bra, or organic bananas were delivered by a trucker.

 

And when the fuel tax money stops rolling in then what? Think the roads are bad now?...

 

Well free universities for everyone isn't that feisable either, but that's not stopping him...

 

Rail is hurting also, Mega's like BNSF are on a hiring freeze... Rail used to be 1/2 the cost of truckload, but then they raised to about 15c under(supposedly wasn't planned, but all companies raised at the same time a bit over a decade ago). Is it more efficient? By far... But the logistics slow it down compared to truckload. My verdict? Flatbed and tanker will always be strong, reefer will move to more produce, van will die off and become a new form of intermodal.

 

Wrong, no way intermodal kills off van. There will always be time sensitive needs in the less than 500 miles segment that rail can never compete with trucks. I'm not talking about loads that get created at 4pm needing to move out ASAP an hour later at 5pm and be there at 6am the next day either. I'm talking about a load that needs to move out 2 or 3 days from now and be there the following day. Rail can't do that. Those needs will always be there. And even for cross country freight the same applies although rail can make improvements there to compete.

 

They already do.