So in mid Feburary I ordered a brand new pickup from Chevy due to the fact that the model is so popular very few stay on the lot (often bought before delivery). I was told a lead time of about 6-8 weeks and I was pretty confident it would be met. I was able to track the order through GM and the vehicle was produced March 24th on schedule. Here I was thinking to myself, man I could make six weeks. Day after day of checking came and past, the truck was made but was waiting on a railcar, in short it took 2 weeks JUST to get a darn railcar to philly area. So I looked into it. I found that after the recession car sales died, so rail companies started scrapping auto racks, then a few years later car sales picked up causing a shortage in 3 level auto racks. So the rail companies, mainly TXX ordered 3 level auto racks to file the void while at the same time continuing to scrap 2 level auto racks which are made for trucks/suvs. Now fast forward to 2014-2015, truck sales have come back in full force, causing a new shortage for 2 level auto racks (ford had a delay on shipping of almost 60 days of trucks sitting waiting for railcars). Currently the rail companies have ordered more 2 level racks, you could imagine the lead time on the racks. It kills me because at one point they didn't have a shortage and were so over equipped that they started to scrap all these cars. Now they are back pedaling to once again have enough racks. To me it seems a big waste that is going on in terms of money for the rail companies, not a waste of metal of course due to recycling/scrapping. It seems they can't get ahead, here are a few of the articles I found.
http://www.autonews.com/article/2012061 ... -shipments
http://www.punchng.com/business/transpo ... yota-ford/
Currently I am in the transport stage of the whole deal now that my truck has a happy home on a rack. On Friday the last know location was Louisville KY and then on Monday the last know location was Connellsville PA. Currently due to no one caring other than myself I have no good information where my truck is currently. I could be languishing on a rack in Connellsville just waiting, could be currently en-route to Twin Oaks VDC, or could in fact be sitting at the VDC. This also brings the point of transport time of rail. I looked up the traveling time ON THE ROAD to Twin Oaks from the plant, about 14 hours without traffic, so realistically about 3 days on a truck once loading, travel, breaks, etc. are factored in. So three days compared to who knows how long, at this point a week and a half. Seems like rail freight is slow as a snail. In the same token though, a dedicated flatbed truck would add a few grand to my vehicle.
Granted this may all be due to how little freight percentage vehicles take up out of all other commodities which is I believe less than 10 percent, so it does seem to make sense that auto racks are further down the list than other transported items. On one side the logistics side of my purchase has been fairly mind numbing and being a person with little patience doesn't help in the slightest. At the same time it is also nice to save money on a vehicle by having it shipped in a way that minimizes cost but that cost is somewhat in conjunction with opportunity costs associated with increased delivery times.
It interesting to think of the Train vs Truck scenario IMO.
Take of this what you will, again looking for comments good or bad(ie own experiences, is this wait time normal, etc). Plus I needed to vent a bit, granted I should taken some of my own advice "suck it up buttercup".
Best Regards,
Cat
