32 DC VELOCITY MARCH 2014 www.dcvelocity.com
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can drop off loads at destination, pick
up another load, and head off without
returning to base, he said. McKay said the
service will increase supply chain coverage
and flexibility beyond what is available
through today’s intermodal offerings.
“By loading four truckloads of cargo
onto one boxcar and then cross-docking
those goods to standard reefer trailers, we
can run those trucks as if they are regular
refrigerated trucks,” McKay said in an
e-mail to DC VELOCITY. “They don’t need
to deadhead back to our yard.”
From the Selma railhead, for example,
trucks will carry goods as far south as San
Diego and as far north as the Bay Area,
McKay said. There are no plans to extend
service into the Pacific Northwest, McKay
said.
Eastbound, goods can be trucked up to
500 miles to points in the Midwest and
into the East and South, he said.
About half of the fleet will consist of dedicated contract carriage, with the remainder coming from the spot market, McKay
said. He declined to identify the name of
the fleet contractor. Private fleets operated
by beneficial cargo owners may also be
involved, meaning a retailer’s trucks can
meet the freight at the intermodal hub
instead of having McKay’s trucks deliver
the loads to the retailer’s door.
The Wilmington distribution hub,
known as RidgePort, is being developed
by Ridge Property Trust, a Chicago-based
private real estate investment trust (REI T).
Van-G Logistics, located in Fowler, Calif.,
11 miles from Fresno, will run the Selma
facility. McKay said the goal is to offer a
full-service operation at both facilities.
LONG LEADTIME
The project took about three years to
consummate, McKay said. BNSF had to
be convinced there was enough market
enthusiasm for the service to commit a
lane in its core Los Angeles-Chicago corridor. Truck services had to be scrutinized
to ensure their availability and reliability
in light of new and more stringent federal
regulations governing their operations.
Potential customers had to be sounded
out to gauge their interest in an unfamiliar project that was neither truck nor
intermodal, he said.
A DIFFERENT DRUMMER
A key distinction between this and
traditional intermodal services is
that it will operate as a rail-truck
hybrid instead of incorporating a
wider-reaching dray, according
to Randy McKay, CEO of McKay
TransCold, an Edina, Minn.-based
company largely responsible for
developing the project. In a typical
intermodal move, truck draymen
move goods to and from the rail
ramps. However, dray equipment
covers only about 200 miles before
drivers must return to origin, McKay
said. With the new service, drivers
