TORONTO: CSX Transportation’s newest terminal outside Montreal is allowing transportation providers such as Schneider l to offer intermodal shippers more direct connections between Canada and the U.S.
The Salaberry-de-Valleyfield terminal, now just four months old, is the first to offer north-south service out of Montreal, bypassing longer reroutes through the Great Lakes via Toronto and Chicago.
That’s good news for shippers, particularly those in the U.S. southeast, that often find northbound truck capacity is tight because of a freight trade imbalance between the North American Free Trade Agreement Partners, Schneider’s senior vice president of intermodal, told JOC.com
In the last quarter, truck crossings at the Canadian border dropped 1.6 percent year-over-year, although rising 4.1 percent on a sequential quarterly basis. Some have suggested that increase may reflect a surge in exports to the U.S. sparked by the imbalance in value between the U.S. and Canadian dollars. There’s been talk that the stronger U.S. greenback and weaker Canadian loonie have encouraged increased exports to the U.S., making northbound shipments may be harder to find.
“We saw a desire for capacity, especially for our customers in Montreal who would ship containers northeast via intermodal to fill in tough service lanes,” Jim Filter, Schneider senior vice president of intermodal, said in a statement. “This additional lane opens up possibilities for current and new customers to ship product quickly and more efficiently to the Southeast instead of by truck and trailer.”
The new lanes connecting to Montreal runs along the U.S. East Coast to Florida ,and from North Baltimore Ohio, home of CSX’s major hub, and St. Louis.
Transit times from the Valleyfield terminal to Florida terminals in Jacksonville, Winter Haven and Miami are as low as seven days; as low as six days to St. Louis; and three days to North Baltimore, Ohio.
Customers seeking to move goods from the U.S. to Montreal can save even more time with Schneider’s Canadian Customs Self-Assessment registration, meaning Canadian Customs fully vets the transportation provider. Moreover, advance completion of paperwork means no customs broker or “wasted time” in delivering product to Canada, according to Schneider.
While Filter told JOC.com that the service will cater to all types of shippers, he expects most of volume on the new service lane to come from Southeast paper shippers.
Schneider quotes prices for roughly 750 intermodal lanes, 280 of which cross the U.S.-Mexico or U.S.-Canada borders.
And although many of those lanes continue to suffer from service hiccups and inconsistency, Filter said he continues to see progress being made as the railroads who own those lanes work to restore service to pre-2014 levels, before the harsh 2013-2014 winter roiled networks.
“We do continue to see improvements on intermodal train speeds,” Filter told JOC.com. “Speaking broadly for the industry, the investment the railroads have made have driven better velocity and less dwell time.”
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