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Shipping majors like Hyundai Merchant Marine, Yang Ming, and Hapag-Lloyd have released their Q1 earnings, reporting deficits in the quarter – as the maritime industry faces a steadily rising oil price and a spot market that had been weak for the initial few months of the year.

“We have had a solid start into the current year, but the market environment is challenging,” said Hapag-Lloyd CEO Rolf Habben Jansen in a statement after the earnings release. “Freight rates have been under pressure, bunker costs and trucking cost in some important markets were up, and we faced a weaker U.S.-Dollar, whereas higher transport volumes and synergies supported the result.”

Hapag-Lloyd posted a net loss of $40.5 million in Q1, which is significantly lesser than its Q1 ‘17 net loss of $68.8 million. The reduction could be attributed to the company merging with United Arab Shipping Company (UASC) last year which incidentally, might render direct year on year comparisons moot.

The much anticipated Maersk Line earnings report is coming out tomorrow, and the forecast has not been much different for the container line, with investment bank Jefferies expecting Maersk’s net profit to hover just above the breakeven point.

 

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The national unemployment rate fell below 4% in April, which calls for celebration. But in the logistics industry currently going through a labor shortage patch, the news is far from welcome. Every segment in the industry – be it transportation, warehousing, or the last-mile sector – is facing a people crunch and with falling bottom line margins and increasing competition, logistics majors are struggling to retain and fill up vacant positions in their supply chain.

These businesses would also have to contend with the warehouse space crisis. The surge of e-commerce has given a boost to warehousing, but realtors across the country are finding it hard to develop new spaces due to steep land rates near densely populated regions. A CBRE report on warehouse modernization explained that the U.S. warehouse inventory is ‘aging’ and modern warehouse space accounts for a meagre 11% of the country’s total warehouse inventory.

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Blockchain uses computer code to record every step of a transaction and delivery in a permanent digital ledger, providing transparency. The ledger can’t be changed unless all involved agree, reducing common disputes over issues such as time stamps, payments and damages.

FedEx’s interest in blockchain and the Internet of Things are part of the company’s strategy to improve customer service and fend off competition, Smith said. FedEx is working with an organization called Blockchain in Transport Alliance that is attempting to set industry standards for using the technology in transportation.

Blockchain has the potential to lower transaction costs, speed up processes and free up working capital, according to the alliance.

FedEx also is experimenting with a small bluetooth-based, low-energy tracking sensor called Tron, Chief Information Officer Robert Carter said at the conference. The company has taken out more patents on Tron than any other technology in the company’s history. FedEx also is part of a team announced May 9 that will test small drone flights at the Memphis International Airport.

 

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The House Appropriations Committee released its Fiscal Year 2019 Transportation, Housing, and Urban Development Funding bill that has set aside $250 million for port projects across the country. The American Association of Port Authorities though, has firmly responded back with a report saying it would need a lot more to handle the multimodal freight spike, asking for $20 billion for rail and multimodal projects over the next decade.

Inland ports and multimodal hubs are mushrooming across the U.S., and the report states that 77% of the ports are planning to improve rail access over the next 10 years to meet the burgeoning demand, while 67% of them consider inadequate funding to be the primary barrier in completing the projects on time.

 

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The U.S. average retail price of diesel fuel rose 1.4 cents to $3.171 a gallon, the seventh straight week the trucking industry’s main fuel has increased in price, according to the weekly report from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration released May 7.

Diesel now costs 60.6 cents more per gallon than it did one year ago.

The average price of diesel rose last week in all regions nationwide. California remained the most expensive place to buy diesel, with a gallon going for $3.863, followed by the West Coast at $3.640. California has seen a gallon of diesel increase 93.6 cents in the past 12 months. The Gulf Coast had the lowest price at $2.955 a gallon, EIA reported.

Gasoline fell a tad, dropping from an average price of $2.846 a gallon April 30 to $2.845 on May 7. The average price of a gallon of regular gas has gone up 43.5 cents from one year ago.

Projections on fuel prices for the rest of this year were quickly revised upward by EIA, and futures traded higher after President Donald Trump’s decision to take the United States out of the 2015 international accord with Iran.

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Norfolk Southern has awarded its 2017 Thoroughbred Chemical Safety Award to 52 chemical customers in recognition of their safe handling of rail-shipped products.

During the year, the railroad said, the companies shipped 153,213 carloads of chemical products regulated as hazardous material on Norfolk Southern’s rail lines without incident.

The annual safety award was established in 1995 to recognize chemical manufacturers and plants that ship 1,000 carloads or more of hazardous products over the railroad without a single incident. Forty-five corporations and seven plants attained the benchmark for 2017. Six of these customers shipped more than 5,000 carloads each without incident.

As a common carrier, Norfolk-Va.-based NS, like other U.S. freight railroads, is obligated to offer transportation of hazardous materials. During 2017, hazardous materials shipped by customers on Norfolk Southern lines included industrial chemicals used to manufacture consumer goods, crude petroleum, ethanol, and fertilizers.

The carrier typically moves these products in tank cars owned or leased by customers, who are responsible for maintaining the cars and ensuring that they are in good working condition and properly secured for transit.

Norfolk Southern is a voluntary participant in the American Chemistry Council’s Responsible Care Partner Program, and observes strict standards in identifying, reducing, and managing process-safety risks in chemical transport.

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On Wednesday, a state representative from Los Angeles presented enactment that would make retailers subject for work infringement at the port trucking organizations they procure. The bill has gotten supports from the chairmen of Long Beach, Los Angeles and Oakland, California’s three greatest port urban communities.

“While we have some extraordinary trucking organizations working at the ports, we have to settle our framework to ensure all truckers are dealt with decently,” said Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia. “We have to raise principles, and wages, in the business while expanding productivity to ensure our ports keep on being motors of development.”

The bill, presented by State Senator Ricardo Lara, would make a rundown of trucking organizations that have a past filled with unpaid last judgments for inability to pay compensation, forcing unlawful costs on workers, neglecting to transmit finance charges and different infringement. A retailer enlisting an organization on this rundown would be mutually at risk for any future state work law infringement by the trucking organization.

“Port truckers are driving the worldwide economy and conveying for the greatest brands however they can scarcely stand to purchase garments for their families,” said Senator Ricardo Lara, who speaks to the Port of Long Beach and encompassing neighborhoods. “These used to be steady employments, and they can be steady employments again if retailers go along with us in enhancing work conditions here in California and returning pride in the driver’s seat.”

Sen. Lara noticed that dray age drivers in California are a to a great extent migrant workforce, and are frequently compelled to rent their own particular trucks so as to work – a plan that may abandon them owing cash as opposed to accepting wages. Under California law, Sen. Lara stated, dray age truckers are representatives, however they are routinely classified as contractual workers to dodge work directions. An authorization exertion is well under way: the California Labor Commissioner’s Office has won in abundance of $45 million in judgments against port trucking organizations, and none of these honors have been toppled on bid.

In a discharge issued Wednesday, Sen. Lara cited a nearby trucker who was worried about the costs he would be compelled to pay for his own new semi truck as a state of work. “I live close to the harbor and my family needs clean air as much our neighbors do. In any case, laws should be passed so misclassified drivers like me are not compelled to pay for costly new zero-outflows trucks that I don’t possess,” said Manuel Martines, a port truck driver from Los Angeles. “In the case of something isn’t done, drivers should go on strike once more.”

The Harbor Trucking Association, an exchange amass sponsored by Total Terminals, APM Terminals, Long Beach Container Terminal and local transportation organizations, said Thursday that Sen. Lara’s enactment was misinformed. “This is another case of a California lawmaker who doesn’t comprehend the drayage . . . industry,” LaBar revealed to USA Today in a messaged articulation. “This attack on the trucker’s entitlement to pick their plan of action needs to stop.”

• Fuel Economy standards— The fuel economy standards are the policies endorsed by the U.S. parliament to intensify the usual fuel economy of cars, light-duty and heavy-duty trucks. The fuel economy standards policy assists to further lessen the greenhouse gas (GHG) emission and also increase the fuel economy for models years through 2025-2050 LDVs and HDVs vehicles. It embraces uniform federal standards to control both the fuel economy and the greenhouse gas emission. The policy demonstrate that the higher fuel economy standards helps in decreasing the oil intake by vehicles by approximately 1.8 billion barrels and also lessens the greenhouse gas emission by 900 million tons. This policy has helped in saving consumer’s money over the long term in improved fuel proficiency, conserved consumer choice, reduce air pollution in form of greenhouse gas emission and other predictable pollutant.

• Transportation Demand Policies for passengers and freight— Transportation Demand refers to the quantity and type of travel people would select under a precise situations taking account feature such as the quality of transport choice accessible. The policy indicates the number of pkm covered every year in the U.S. Transportation is one basic cause of greenhouse gas emission which give upsurge to important air pollution and noise, that can extremely harm human health and ecosystem. The Transportation Demand policy is vital for the environmental influence of passengers and goods transport due to the variances in the environmental performance of transport types. For instance, rather than saying that “Vehicle travel is expected to increase by 20% during the next decade” it would be more correct to say that “Vehicle travel is expected to increase by 20% during the next decade if current developments continue, or 10% if the community invests more in alternative modes, or not at all if the community also implements smart development land use policies, and is expected to weakening by 10% if supplementary TDM policies are executed, such as proficient road and parking pricing.”

• A Feebate Policy—The Feebate policy is the fee imposed on the sale of unproductive passenger LDVs which is being used to refund a discount to the buyer’s efficient passenger LDVs. Feebate policy is one of the best available policy choices to reduce passenger car emissions. This policy create fees and refunds based on vehicles greenhouse gas emissions or other air pollutant or fuel economy standards. Feebate policy levy a fee on vehicles with high CO2 emissions or fuel intake (i.e., low fuel economy) and offer a rebate to vehicles with low CO2 emissions or fuel intake (i.e., high fuel economy).

• A low carbon fuel standard (LCFS)— A low-carbon fuel standard (LCFS) is the policy endorsed to lessen the carbon intensity in transportation fuels as related to conventional petroleum fuels, such as gasoline and diesel. The most common low-carbon fuels are substitute fuels and domestic fossil fuels, such as natural gas (CNG and LPG). Low carbon fuel standard (LCFS) proposals are programs that take target solely at the American fuel supply. An LCFS is planned to lower the quantity of carbon dioxide emissions in the transportation segment by striking high directives on American fuel manufacturers to pay for products and technologies they do not make and that may not even be available. The only way to decrease carbon from gasoline or diesel is to substitute it with something else or combine more of a non-petroleum or open “lower carbon” fuel into the fuel supply. This emboldens a move from petroleum fuels to biofuels or electricity. A study by a research organization found that a national LCFS on transportation fuels would increase the average U.S. gasoline and diesel prices by as much as 80 percent within five years and up to 170 percent within 10 years. The enactment of a nationwide LCFS in the United States would decrease the global greenhouse gas emissions linked with the changes in crude oil transport by up to 19 million metric tons each year.

The villages of Northbrook, Glenview, Deerfield, Bannockburn, and the City of Lake Forest hosted a symposium with the aim of discussing The Future of Rail Freight Traffic. The symposium was held on October 11, 2017, in Bannockburn, Trinity International University located on 2065 Half Day Road, in Waybright Center, Melton Hall from 7 to 8.30 p.m.

The program was open to the general public and any interested members of all the specific communities involved were invited to be in attendance. There was no charge for the event. There has been an increased attention that has been generated in these communities and others in the Chicago area concerning the matter of freight transportation by the local rail lines. Many residents living near rail infrastructure raised questions and concerns about recent probable freight train effects associated with any improvements that had been profiled in the Environmental Assessment for the Chicago-Milwaukee Intercity Rail Corridor. Other interests that came up included discussions concerning a freight-specific bypass rail line and also the functioning of the area freight yards.

This October 11 Symposium also addressed the current freight concerns such as safety, cargo transportation, what the Chicagoland area was to expect with time, and much more. There was a short presentation and a Question and Answer session that followed. The session was mediated by the Depaul University, Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development Director Joseph P. Schwieterman with a PhD from the School of Public Service.

Mr Scwieterman commented that it was important for citizens to understand more fully the dynamics of that form of transportation with the constant modernization and improvement of their rail freight system. He also added that it was important to keep updated on the happenings of the ever-changing sector whether one was simply a resident of a community with a railroad, under employment by a business that is shipping via rail, a train rider, or even a commuter.

The first panellist was Mott Macdonald’s Mark Walbrun PE, who oversees the company’s Rail & Transit Practice on the eastern end of the United States. Mr Walbrun has since 1975 managed notable North American freight and passenger railroad projects within Chicago and the United States. He is the current chairperson of the Transportation Research Board on Shared Rail Corridors and has leadership positions in various industry associations.

The second panellist was Laura Wilkinson, who is Metro Strategies’ Executive Vice President. Laura is involved in infrastructure initiatives, economic development, and regional policy and planning and she also spearheads communication and outreach activities for major programs and projects. She has worked on the CREATE program for more than a decade on the Chicago Department of Transportation’s behalf.

The Metropolitan Planning Council’s Audrey Wennink was the third panellist and she plays a role guiding the council’s efforts in transportation all while leading the Regional Planning and Infrastructure Advisory Committee. Audrey has also worked on advocacy, grant writing, cost-benefit analysis for the Association of American Railroads, IDOT, and CREATE to advance highway operations, passenger rail, and freight rail for 70 projects within greater Chicago.