High noon

摘要

North American infrastructure is straining under the weight of growing intermodal volumes, and the railroads are in a good position to benefit from that. But will margins justify prolonged investment? Containerised freight from Asia exploded onto both the East and West Coast of North America in 2004, and the railroads had to cope with a significant portion of the deluge. Railroad volumes for the US were up by 10.4% in 2004, reaching nearly 11 million units. This growth shows no signs of slowing, making intermodal traffic one of the biggest drivers of record volumes and revenue growth for the railroads. As a result, railroads are looking more closely at intermodal investment to cope with long-term capacity. The western US railroads have been particularly keen to invest in intermodal as a large part of their business - for example, Burlington Northern Santa Fe's (BNSF) Logistics Park Chicago. Paul Nowicki, assistant vice president of government and public policy at BNSF, stated: "The growth of intermodal is certainly what's driven the double-tracking of the Los Angeles-Chicago routes, and enormous investments in terminals in the last 10 to 15 years.'