Ports of Indiana: Building on Success
The Ports of Indiana is a statewide port authority, established in 1963, which operates three ports: two on the Ohio River, one on Lake Michigan. Port officials refer to the three as “America’s Premier Inland Port System.” They cite location, location, location, providing access via two critical freight arteries – the Great Lakes and the Inland Waterway System and proximity to the world’s most productive industrial and agricultural regions. The Ports is the only statewide port authority in the Midwest.
What’s the Cost of Unscheduled Lock Outages?
Unscheduled lock closures burden the shipper supply chain by more than $1 billion annually, according to estimates from two Tennessee universities. A study, “The Impacts of Unscheduled Lock Outages”, released today by the National Waterways Foundation (NWF) and the Maritime Administration (MARAD), looks at the economic impacts of unscheduled lock outages and highlights economic benefits associated with reliable inland waterways navigation. The Center for Transportation Research…
Indiana Ranks Top 10 for 109 Logistics Categories
The newly released 2016 Indiana Logistics Directory reports that Indiana ranks high nationally in its ability to move freight via truck, rail, water and air. The state is ranked in the top five states in more than 25 logistics-related categories and in the top 10 in 109. The Directory, published by the Ports of Indiana, showcases Indiana's vast transportation infrastructure and includes national logistics rankings, maps and freight statistics. According to the Directory, Indiana ranks first among all states in pass-through interstates, is home to the country's largest producer of truck trailers and is ranked third in truck tractor registrations.
Canadian National Rides High in Intermodal Growth
The Montreal-based Canadian National Railway (CN) reported a higher fourth-quarter profit and raised its dividend, bucking a weak trend among major North American railroads. However, it has given an uncertain but far rosier outlooks for 2016 than most of its North American counterparts after strong international intermodal volume gains helped propel it to a double-digit profit rise. CN said profit rose to $941-million while diluted earnings per share increased by 15 per cent to $1.18. Revenue fell by 1 per cent to $3.2-billion as carloads declined by 8 per cent. It earned 941 million Canadian dollars ($669 million), or C$1.18 a share, up from C$844 million, or C$1.03, a year earlier.
Train Lobby Pushes to Weaken Safety Rule
Billionaire investor Warren Buffett is set to be a chief beneficiary of a bid by Senate Republicans to weaken new regulations to improve train safety in the $2.8 billion crude-by-rail industry, a key cog in the development of the vast North American shale oil fields. A series of oil train accidents, including the July 2013 explosion of a train carrying crude in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, that killed 47 people, led U.S. and Canadian regulators to announce sweeping safety rules in May. Among other things, U.S. oil trains are required to install new electronically controlled pneumatic (ECP) brakes. But in late June, the Republican-controlled Senate Commerce Committee approved a measure to drop that requirement, and order years of new research to confirm the safety benefits of ECP brakes.
U.S. Drivers to Face Delays at Rail Crossings due to Oil Shipments
Runaway oil production could slow road traffic as drivers face longer delays to cross train tracks in many congested regions, a U.S. study released on Friday predicted. Oil, coal and grain shipments are taxing the national rail grid as the deliveries of those commodities are expected to climb along with commercial shipments in the coming years, according to the report from the Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress. Freight movements on the tracks are due to rise 51 percent over 2007 levels by 2040, according to the Transportation Department, and so exceed 28 billion tons per year. One factor is oil train deliveries out of North Dakota's energy patch that neared 250,000 carloads in 2012 compared with roughly 10,000 in 2007, says the study.
News: Unusual Propulsion System for Wisconsin Ferry
The Merrimac Ferry, which crosses the Wisconsin River between Sauk and Columbia counties, is Wisconsin's only free ferry. It shuttles WIS 113 traffic between Okee on the east bank and Merrimac on the west. In the 150 plus years that a ferry has operated at this location it has been propelled by muscle, river current, gasoline engine and diesel. Most recently it has pulled itself along on a pair of cables crossing the river. The ferry is so popular that it has not been replaced by a bridge and, in spite of nearby bridges, car loads of tourist line up regularly to ride it. The ferry's popularity is such that this past winter a larger 15-car vessel has been built to replace the existing 1960s era 12 car Colsac II. To be named the Colsac III 105 by 44-ft.
