Full Rail Freight Service (Intermodal – Truck-Rail-Truck) in the USA & Canada
Rapid Express Freight provides rail freight service to move a broad portfolio of products across the country. Shipping freight by rail minimizes the effect on the environment, takes traffic off congested highway systems, and minimizes fuel consumption and transportation costs.
What is Intermodal Rail Freight Service?
The term Intermodal simply means that your freight will move by more than one mode of transportation. In our case, it will be truck-rail-truck. Our Intermodal Freight service is very similar to over the road truckload services. Your freight will be picked up and delivered by truck. For more on how our Intermodal freight works, please visit our page “Rapid Express Rail Intermodal Freight Service” for more info.
The intermodal rail freight service by Rapid Express Freight has opened up new markets for us since we can now ship our heavy freight economically from the east coast to the west coast.
Our direct partnership with the major rail freight carriers provides and arranges for full intermodal (truck-rail-truck) terminal services. Containers and trailers are loaded and unloaded from trains, and trucks provide the link between intermodal terminals and the customer. Your freight is picked up by truck from your dock and delivered by truck to your customers dock.
Rail containers can also be dropped at the shippers or receivers location if extended time is needed for loading or unloading of the freight. Rail freight is a very good alternative to moving freight by truck because of the environmental benefits. Rail transport is also very energy efficient.
Intermodal rail freight shipping is now no longer only for larger shippers
Traditionally, large shippers would build factories and warehouses near rail lines and have a section of track on their property called a siding where goods are loaded onto or unloaded from rail cars. Most of these factories, produced goods in bulk. Rail freight was only economical for shipping bulk (multiple cars) or commodities loaded in bulk like coal. It simply wasn’t economical to divert a full train to just load a few rail wagons.
With the increase use of intermodal (meaning more than one mode of transportation), the small to medium sized shipper can now ship via rail. Major rail hubs have cargo freight trains loaded and unloaded in huge rail yards like a container port. Rapid Express in partnership with CSX and other rail operators arranges the full move. We arrange for an empty container to be picked up from the rail yard. The empty container comes on truck to the shipper’s dock to be loaded. The full container is then returned to the rail yard and loaded on a train. We do the same procedure at the delivery point.
