As a youth I drove farm trucks to the local elevator to drop the harvest off(at the ripe age of 14), was but a few miles and slow. Today I haul from farms and the remaining elevators to the barge services and rail support to move that harvested grain out country or to the larger cities to mills and processors. In those Good Old Olden days the trains carried the majority of what is now trucked, rail lines, rail side heads are being stripped up or abandoned as I write here, elevators are ever more reliant on semi trucks, farms that once used the elevators now store much of their own materials and have trucks haul directly to the end bulk process yards. With the new regulations, with the lack of qualified help and us 'Old Farts' already once if not some twice retired gone back to work the Ag industry ALL industry survives on borrowed time. What can you all see as I do not as to what happens in as little as two or five even ten years from now with as you all know, more rails coming out, fewer truck drivers either willing or able to do the duty and so few wanting to work as hard as we all have?
All I can say is for the parents who didn't teach their kids an honest day's work for a day's pay, the chickens will come home to roost. And they and their kids will scratch their heads wondering what happened to all the food this great land used to produce. Mike
It's getting to the point unless an elevator can load a unit train of grain in 24-36 hours the rail lines won't even service it. The elevator to terminal rates around here are so low I don't see how sitting in line at the terminal is anything more than a hobby.
I understand the rates issue so will grain just stop moving when the rails do not service and trucks are NA?
They built a new elevator close to me that is serviced by rail. Its a lot closer than Kc Mo were most hauled to. It will save alot of miles on the trucks i work on so less work for me i like that.The Rail road did alot of stuff to hurt them selfs like high prices and when the shipment got to town it took days to get it unloaded.
Nope... They will find an immigrant group that will do it cheaper with government assistance. That's what happened out here in central Wa. state. In 1982 you could make a fair living hauling grain to the Columbia river terminals from north central Washington, I had an 8V-71 powered GMC 9500 and a 40' hopper bottom that made good money. Later in the mid 80's we got all these Mexican truckers with 4 axle trucks and 4 axle trailers that undercut everybody out of business. Suck part was we paid for their stuff because they were using "minority grants" to buy their new Peterbilts with walk-in sleepers.
Old retired truck driver / customer was talking " trucking " to me just yesterday. 80 years old ... Said in the 50's & 60 's a feller could go out & borrow the cash to buy a rig & still make a decent money to feed the family hauling . He noted things started changing around the late 1970's early 80's ?
Same thing happened in Florida sugar cane and fruit. The Cubans took that over. Eighteen to a two bed room apartment. Working three different shifts. The beds never get cold that way. I was up through your area a while back and saw some interesting things.
I can relate to the changes mid 70's to early 80's as Dereg took effect. Flatrack haulers buying taller side kits hauling anything that would fit, Bedbug equipment used to haul packaged commodities, dry vans being exchanged to Refers to take on ANY load they could. Bad days then, went from making enough to own my own rig running for IML Eagle Division to watching all so many lines close up. Ran Columbia Riverside many days and nights, still remember seeing the Bonneville project lights knowing I was closing in on Portland and my partners home where he would take back over the driving. We bought the truck together with the Reciprocity of Red River Trucking. He would run 3-4 months needing a few days off and I would spell him for relief, got harder and harder to make enough to warrant the expenses.
I Have had a Cargill barge loading facility for a next door neighbor for the last 40 years. In their peak busy season which is right now they load 1 barge of either corn or soybeans 5 days a week. High water and a lack of available barges is all that slows them down. I don't even know anyone who owns a farm that doesn't own their own trucks. 90% of them own more than one. Straight trucks are in the extreme minority. There are multiple rail loading facilities all over my area. They have cut deeply into deliveries to the river not only because of shorter hauls but they pay more per bushel.
I am driving a Farm's truck, the aspect is their insurance is on the rise, the cost of maintenance on older equipment is a killer as is trying to buy newer being questionable as to return. The owner has noted it gets much worse they will be forced to stop hauling commercially as not cost effective, they would then haul only their own products so what of the poor Joe with 250 or less acres cultivated and a twenty five year old or older grain bed truck that will not do the 100 miles to a operation as Cargill barge loading on a regular basis or no truck at all? As to rail loading stations we have but the N&S thru Mexico the BNSF from SW to STL and UP on two sets trackage from KC to STL and few stops between on any of them. Are currently hauling truck loads from Mexico, Montgomery City, Rhineland, Meta MO multiple Farms between that invested in their own elevator storage and a few other odd MFA centers. Many of the MFA centers are moved or moving away from what is fast becoming Urban with rail heads to deeper rural and NO rail support.
it seems to be as some would say " conspiracy theory" that BIG farms and government are pushing out the small guy in all businesses. im in the northeast and the small dairy farms are being destroyed by the much larger farms with price fixing and regulation, end result is just like what home depot did to small hardware stores, they put most of them out of business then raised the prices in home depot and most people dont have much of a choice but to goto home depot as they are the only one left standing, or one of the other BIG box stores, but most the mom and pop businesses have been eliminated..I see that happening in the farming industry too...
You can thank Reagan for deregulating the freight industry in 1981. No more grand daddy permits it opened the freight to anyone and it was down hill from there. Rates went in the toilet because everybody and their brother was getting into the trucking business. Fact. Go price some steel right now- price quote is only good for two days and in some cases if you procrastinate over night on ordering the place that gave you the quote will be out of material the next morning. The price is climbing and by the way those cheap prices on truck brake drums at $60.00 per drum well that's going away too those will be $105.00 before long right along with everything else.
Been there don ALL of that, today's super truckers do not have to buy reciprocity as we did in the 80's that too disappeared then as noted shooting themselves in the foot to take others out by minimum bid wars and trucks fell apart. As to steel, just bought some project metal, a small trailer load, gal that gave me the quote last week stated after Friday last the price was automatically 20% higher and would be fluctuating from now on.