What is a captive shipper?
Served by only one railroad. But he may have trucks or water or pipe-line transportation, but sitll called captive.
One whom you’ve tied up so he doesn’t get away.
Glad to have you here. please come back for the midnight show.
But seriously, my understanding, as far as trains.com cares, is that it’s one whose situation requires that they ship by rail, and maybe even use just one railroad, since that’s the only one that serves their plant. And nowadays not every shipper fits that bill, since the dreaded tractor trailer which can use our nation’s highways can come in the front door even if the railroad siding and loading docks are in the back.
So we also have to say that the shipper not only must have rail service, but that their business is such that it would be awkward for them to use trucks. Now we’re talking about the traditional unit train, bulk commodity stalwarts of the railroad industry such as steel, automobiles, coal. Other shippers I suppose we’d call free, able to roam the plains of delivery options and graze as they will.
Isn’t it more than just one railroad but also has no alternatives like truck or water plus having the only railroad in town or to and from the shipper’s location(s). I wonder how much shippers can complain when they often chose a site along, maybe even purchased the site from, a given railroad and how often that is the case. If so, they theoretically can’t complain. If however, the were served by two or more railroads all of which have either merged or otherwise abandoned the routes, then there is more cause for complaints. There may be many complications than the current road is simply holding them captive.
A shipper who has been caged or leashed.
I know I know…don’t quit your day job
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Primarily a mythical concept. An imagined shipper who has access to only one railroad and has no other viable transportation alternative.
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A concept created by lawyers to enrich themselves.
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A shipper with a logistics department that couldn’t think their way out of a paper bag.
The issue is this: "Where a railroad has market dominance—i.e., a shipper is captive to a single railroad—
its transportation rates for common carrier service must be reasonable." STB (Docket EP-715(4))…The deregulated trucking industry or water carriers do not come into play. It’s all about competitive rates and more than one railroad being theoretically able to access an industry.
If 3) holds, the shipper needs to ship the logistics department and get a new one.[:)]
Not if it’s family and comes with the " so I’m here and it’s not in my job description" mantra.[:-,]
A new auto plant in (Alabama?) insisted the railroad that served it grant a competitor track rights between the plant and the competitor’s line as a condition of selecting that location. The railroads were CSX and NS, but I don’t remember whose track was involved.
Nissan did the same thing at the large plant they built near Canton, MS several years ago. Plant is located on IC/CN, but KCS was granted rights of some kind to access. My understanding is that Nissan made the KCS rights a condition of locating the plant there.
- If they’re an energy company, a shipper with plenty of captive customers of their own.
Yep, something about calling the kettle black. [(-D]
greyhounds may have made point 2 with his tongue in cheek, but that’s the part of the issue that makes the possibility of re-reg more than just an intellectual exercise.
That is what I find most interesting in these ‘captive customer’ “battles”. Those complaining the loudest have a monopoly position with their product lines to their own customers.
The problem as I see it. In the past these customers could dictate to the railroads the conditions they wanted for their transportation needs - the railroads being financially ‘weak’ accepted the terms as they needed the traffic to maintain their cash flows. Now the carriers are in a stronger financial position and can demand to be paid for the cost of the service and some profit,
The ‘capitve customers’ want to return to the days when they had the power in the business relationship. The other thing that enters into the equation; after Staggers the carriers tended to negotiate long term contracts with these types of customers. Contracts that in reality were ‘sweetheart’ deals; especially when you compare costs of the 1980’s and now the mid Two Thousand teens. With it now time to