This thread, and a few other threads, caused me to recall that there used to be a well defined set of intermodal (TOFC) plans available in the US (probably Canada too), always denoted by roman numerals
From a book “Supply Chain Management: Concepts and Cases” by Rahul V. Allekar that I found on Google-books:
The puzzling part - that book is from 2005[!] - I thought these type of plans, at least in a ICC-regulated legal sense, were history by then (the ICC certainly was)? Are the plans still used simplly as contract defintions with no official regulatory meaning?
So back in the day, If I understand this, a PRR trailer moving on a PRR Truc-train flat (I guess Trailer-Train would be considered a rail company), hauled from originator to destination via a PRR contracted truck-tractor would be under Plan II, while for Plan IV, I can’t think of anything until you get to the 1980s and Maesrk containers riding in Maesrk well-cars from/to Maesrk leased terminals. Plan I doesn’t seem to even involve rail at all, unless companies like PIE
Well, the old traditional intermodal “Plans” began to fade on March 23, 1981 - the day intermodal was deregulated. They were creatures of regulation. Government economic regulation of rail intermodal from 1931 through regulation’s end in 1981 can best be described as inane. This regulation did great harm to the US economy.
I’m not convinced your source has a good handle on the topic. He left out the “Plan” that moved the greatest volume, Plan II 1/2.
Plan I was a motor carrier substituting rail movement for over the road movement. The motor carrier had to have highway use authority (another regulatory absurdity) from origin to destination. Instead of driving the trailer to destination they brought it to a rail terminal. The railroad then moved the trailer to a destination terminal where the motor carrier picked it up for further movement. Trailers could be owned by either the motor carrier or the railroad. This is how UPS (and some other motor freight) business moved on the rail. The freight was billed to the shipper by the motor carrier and the railroad took a “division” of the revenue. This division was usually a flat per vehicle charge.
Plan II was when the railroad provided the origin and destination trucking in railroad controlled trailers. It was greatly limited because the government morons greatly restricted railroad trucking operations for no good reason. (For example, the Santa Fe couldn’t truck a load down from Milwuakee to the Chicago terminal and then take it to L.A. on a train. Such a thing just wasn’t allowed.)
Plan II 1/2 came to become the dominate plan by volume. (except for transcontinental loads) It was an intermodal terminal to intermodal terminal rate in railroad controlled trailers. It was a result of the malignant regulation and it had a lot of bad features, but it was the best possible solution under re