Transportation news: new report examines ways to spur intermodal infrastructure 

Jeff Berman, Senior Editor -- Logistics Management, 11/28/2007

ATLANTA—The role and concept of intermodal transportation—as it relates to the entire freight transportation network in the United States—is one which is an “orphan with no country,” according to Theodore Prince, principal consultant for T. Prince and Associates LLC, and Thomas L. Finkbiner, chairman of the University of Denver Intermodal Transportation Institute.

At a press conference at the Transcomp conference hosted by the National Industrial Transportation League, the Intermodal Association of North America, and the Transportation Intermediaries Association in Atlanta earlier this month, Prince and Finkbiner presented the findings of their report entitled “Leveraging the Freight Network: 10 Steps to Improved Modal Connectivity.”

The report takes a detailed look at what needs to happen for intermodal to take a more prominent seat at the freight transportation table, explaining various ways in which intermodal can make a meaningful difference during a time in which shippers and carriers are faced with limited infrastructure challenges, rising gas and energy prices, and a declining economy, among other factors. The report’s research was based on roughly 180 questionnaires and 40 in-person interviews with transportation CEOs and principal officers to discuss surface transportation issues. The report was sponsored by the National Center for Intermodal Transportation and the Foundation for Intermodal Research and Education.

Another challenge intermodal—and freight transportation in general—faces is the lack of a national focus on the myriad transportation issues the U.S. is up against, according to Finkbiner.

“There is not going to be a national debate on surface transportation in an election year,” he said. “That is a sad thing, because if you look at the amount of money involved and the estimates of up to $1.6 trillion needed to fix our freight transportation infrastructure, it rivals things like Social Security and healthcare costs. And when you look at what is actually being proposed for transportation funding compared to what is needed, it is clear there is a massive disconnect in transportation policy. ”

While infrastructure for trucking and rail get categorized based on reports and analyses for their respective industries, Finkbiner explained—and the report’s results confirmed— that intermodal is more like an “orphan” mode with no constituency, because everyone is an intermodal constituent.

Main findings: The main takeaways of the report were comprised of a list of ten steps that Prince explained were focused on a single idea: that transportation—whether it is freight or passenger—is an asset-based, network-operating industry. And in order for the transportation industry to function well it needs to be able to have reliable capabilities and capacity for those arcs moving within all the nodes in the transportation network.

Some of the ten steps that would augment the intermodal network the report cited included: reinforcing the importance of funding intermodal connector projects; expanding the definition of those connectors to include more facilities and roads, strengthening the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) by raising fuel taxes and indexing them; developing projects to encourage simultaneous growth or freight and passenger systems; and launching a short sea shipping pilot program with new incentives to develop its potential.

“What we found is that intermodal is the leverage tool that actually improves the performance of all the individual modes,” said Prince, “and the problem is that intermodal by definition is not a single mode. It does not fit into the functional stovepipe modal administration that we have in the U.S.”

Amidst these various obstacles facing intermodal, Prince noted that the freight transportation industry is speaking very loudly, but the government is just not listening.

“When we talk about transportation, we talk about these modal stovepipes—ocean, truck, rail, barge, and air,” commented Prince. “But…transportation in itself is a policy stovepipe, because when we talk about transportation, you can’t talk about it without considering other issues like energy, environment, homeland defense, and trade.”

And even with all the time and effort the United States spends talking about things like trade and exports, Prince said it does nothing to facilitate the mechanism by which that freight will move to and from the U.S.

Fuel tax funding: With funding for infrastructure and capacity expansion severely limited, funding from a fuel tax is something that works, said Finkbiner.

“There is no way of getting around that,” he said. “It is the only mechanism of its kind in the world for funding these projects, and it does create money…and we don’t know if the government can come up with something else as good.”