Longer-term, how will supply chains change and how will rails be able to participate in them? (Tony Hatch)

Abhbw 2010

Ecommerce exploded in Q3/20 (from 16 to 21% of retails sales – quarter to quarter!) as we all know. This represents as we also know the acceleration of an existing trend….but what we might see change is a slight deviation from JIT requiring regional hubs or more “mega-DCs”- which could allow for the density that would be attractive for intermodal. CSX has recently gone on record as saying that they expect to grow carload business by “a point or two” above GDP and IM at 2X/GDP. That requires consistent and faster service – you know the drill.