Facing new challenges in 2020, the rail sector needs more digital technology to help it stay relevant and work smarter, better, and faster.

As organizations across all industries invest in digitization that helps them run their supply chains better, faster, and smarter, rail is one sector that’s ripe for innovation in this area.

Combatting the effects of the global pandemic and its resultant impacts on business, the U.S. rail sector also needs technology to help it reduce its dependency on fossil fuels, keep up with shippers’ needs, improve supply chain visibility, and do more with less. 

“Over the last five decades, rail transport has faced major headwinds. The transformation of global supply chains has made the logistics business more challenging than ever, with increasing pressure to deliver fast and flexible services at a lower cost,” World Bank points out. 

“In that quickly-evolving context, freight rail is grappling with fierce competition from road transport—a trend that will only intensify under the effect of disruptive technologies like autonomous trucks and on-demand mobility services,” it continues. “In addition, railways around the world have been hit by significant government budget cuts, limiting their ability to invest in infrastructure or maintain high service standards.”

Pandemic Pressures

In Supply & Demand Chain Executive, Esri’s Josh Belhadj paints a picture of a transportation sector that’s awakened to these challenges and has begun to put more financial investment, time, and energy into digitization. In Freight Rails Digitize Supply Chain to Compete Amid Pandemic and Climate Change, he says rail operators are using digital tools to gain competitive advantage and offset the impacts of COVID, which pushed total U.S. freight rail carloads down 17.6% in July 2020 vs. July 2019, according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR). 

“Railroads must keep pace with the modern, consumer-driven economy that expects shipments to be delivered in a trackable number of days, not weeks,” Belhadj writes. “As a signal of industry changes, precision-scheduled railroading (PSR) focuses on moving freight cars faster and more reliably, freeing up capacity to enable business growth. Many digital innovations are also catalyzing change in the freight rail industry to meet customers’ modern supply chain needs with more precise visibility and predictability.” 

Let’s not forget that even pre-COVID, the trucking industry was grappling with driver shortages, reduced capacity, and inferior fuel economy. These issues pushed more shippers to explore the options in rail transport—a trend that rail operators would like to see continue through 2020 and beyond. 

“Railroads have made efforts to capture market share,” Belhadj writes, noting that railroads use one gallon of diesel fuel to move a ton of freight 473 miles, a figure that’s four times more efficient than trucking. “This is due in part to trains having a significant friction advantage over trucks and to the adoption of optimized fuel routing systems that prescribe optimal throttle levels through the train’s route based on detailed topographic data, such as hills, slopes, and curves.”

More Visibility, Please

Acknowledging that digital operating systems have been helping manage rail transportation for years, Belhadj says that as these systems become integral to operations, transportation companies are “mining their location data to recreate operations and look for insights to redesign or optimize.” They’re also looking for better visibility both into their customers’ and their own supply chains. 

With 80% of U.S. freight moving less than 250 miles, Belhadj expects that number to increase as e-commerce—now being accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic—allows customers to order a wider variety of goods, promises ever faster delivery times, and allows end-to-end tracking. 

“Consumer expectations for fast delivery and shipment visibility ripple through the supply chain as retailers demand visibility from distributors, distributors from manufacturers, and manufacturers from suppliers,” he writes. “Railroads and other transportation providers can no longer operate without transparency, reliability, and velocity.” 

World Bank’s industry experts agree. “It is hard to overstate the impact of digitization on the railway sector. In fact, digital technology is disrupting pretty much every component of railway operation,” they point out. It sees advancement in automation, modern control/signaling systems, the Internet of Things (IoT), and communication advancements like 5G as just a handful of the enabling technologies that are helping rail achieve its digitization goals. 

“With these breakthroughs, digital development provides a unique opportunity for railways not just to stay relevant,” World Bank adds, “but also to increase their share in the overall logistics market, and to become an integral part of the transition toward greener, more sustainable freight transport.”

A Critical Tool in Rail’s Digitization Efforts

IntelliTrans’ Global Control Tower provides high levels of supply chain transparency; aggregates, completes, and enhances data from a variety of sources; offers visibility into and execution of different aspects of the supply chain; and generates data-driven alerts and analytics that ask deeper questions and deliver meaningful insights.

By leveraging tracking information, the Global Control Tower provides analytics that measures key performance indicators (KPIs) like fleet cycle time, origin/destination dwell time, lane and hauler performance, back orders, freight spend, load optimization, and more. With their rate, equipment, lease, tracking, and invoice data in a central repository that’s accessible 24/7, companies can position themselves for success in any market conditions. 

If you’re not already making full use of the data generated by your transportation management systems, here are 12 ways that you can start leveraging the data produced by this important supply chain management platform.

The world is producing data at an astounding rate. The entire digital universe is expected to reach 44 zettabytes this year, and by 2025 an estimated 463 exabytes of data (the equivalent of 212,765,957 DVDs) will be created every day around the world. 

At least some of that data volume can be credited to transportation management systems (TMS) and other platforms that are running global supply chains. 

Whether they’re providing visibility into a company’s transportation operations, helping companies select the best carrier, ensuring the timely delivery of freight, or managing trade compliance information, TMS gathers and produces a large volume of data—information that can be used both to address problems and make better decisions.

12 Ways to Use Your TMS Data

1. Pinpoint and fix inaccuracies. Unlike manual systems and spreadsheets, TMS provides a 360-degree view of a company’s transportation activities. This makes finding and fixing errors much easier than if you had to review multiple different systems and spreadsheets.
2. Turn transportation into revenue-generating machine. Historically considered a cost center, transportation has become a competitive advantage for TMS users that have the data and information they need for good decision-making right at their fingertips.
3. Create higher levels of predictability. We’re all operating in an uncertain world right now, but TMS can help “even out” some of the ups and downs revealing the lagging indicators and leading indicators around freight volume and spend (among many other data points).
4. Make better predictions. Using accurate forecasting data, companies can set better expectations around their current and future freight needs—regardless of the current conditions (i.e., capacity crunches, driver shortages, cost increases, and so forth).
5. Improve relationships with carriers. Everyone wants to be a “shipper of choice” for their transportation providers these days, and TMS facilitates this by generating data that you can share with those suppliers. They can turn around and use this data to more cost-effectively allocate their transportation capacity and improve services.
6. Optimize your own fleets. If you have a private fleet, the data generated by your TMS can help you arrange backhauls and optimize the utilization of that fleet. For example, you can use information about fleet usage and availability to figure out where to place equipment and drivers. This, in turn, will help you maximize your investments in vehicles and labor.
7. Eliminate dock congestion. Integrated with a dock scheduling tool, TMS can schedule pickup and delivery appointments and provide real-time visibility and predictability across logistics operations. For example, if the data tells you that refrigerated packaged goods must be loaded at temperature-controlled docks, you can build dynamic, intelligent schedules that alleviate dock congestion and reduce carrier wait times.
8. Get one version of the truth. Similarly, TMS can connect to other systems, such as a warehouse management system (WMS) or yard management system (YMS), to offer the end-to-end visibility that provides one version of the truth and enhances decision-making.
9. Flatten seasonal peaks and valleys. Using your TMS’ historical data, you can easily identify business fluctuations and work to line up transportation capacity ahead of those peaks—versus getting stuck in a high-cost/low-capacity environment during the high seasons.
10.  Accurately answer the “Where’s My Stuff?” question. Your TMS can tell you when a customer delivery is within a mile of its final destination, or when it has stopped on the highway due to a breakdown. With this data in hand, you can confidently provide updates to customers who want to know when their orders are going to arrive.
11.  Improve reporting. All companies want good visibility into their capacity, freight volumes, and freight tracking, and most TMS platforms include reporting features that help you leverage these and other data points when developing your transportation plan.
12.  Get a “big picture” perspective across your entire supply chain operation. Working together, TMS and supply chain visibility platforms provide the data you need to be able to efficiently track carrier performance, keep those carriers accountable, maximize your own transportation assets, and provide high levels of service to your own customers.

Starting Putting Your Supply Chain Data to Work Today

IntelliTrans’ Global Control Tower provides high levels of supply chain transparency; aggregates, completes, and enhances data from a variety of sources; offers visibility into and execution of different aspects of the supply chain; and generates data-driven alerts and analytics that ask deeper questions and deliver meaningful insights.

By leveraging tracking information, the Global Control Tower provides analytics that measures key performance indicators (KPIs) like fleet cycle time, origin/destination dwell time, lane and hauler performance, back orders, freight spend, load optimization, and more. With their rate, equipment, lease, tracking, and invoice data in a central repository that’s accessible 24/7, companies can position themselves for success in any market conditions.

A mode of transportation already known for its “green” qualities, rail could make some further sustainability gains if a new bipartisan act becomes a law.

The railcar industry is no exception. In August, six U.S. representatives proposed a new tax credit for freight railcar owners that supports the manufacture and refurbishment of safer, greener railcar equipment in the U.S. 

Known as the “Freight Rail Assistance and Investment to Launch Coronavirus-era Activity and Recovery (RAILCAR) Act,” H.R. 8082 offers freight railcar owners a time-limited 50% tax credit for purchasing new freight railcars or refurbishing existing freight railcars that result in improving capacity or fuel by at least 8%, Railway Age reports.

Credits for Modernizing

The bill provides a separate tax credit for the scrapping of a railcar based on the depreciated value of that particular asset, and a 50% tax credit for capital expenditures on equipment or technology enhancements in railcar-related manufacturing or repair shops, Railway Age states.  To be eligible for the credit, railcars being replaced must have been in service during the 48 months prior to enactment of the bill and must be permanently taken out of service.

According to Progressive Railroading, the credit encourages freight railcar owners to modernize their fleet to better meet precision scheduled railroading standards, accelerate the industry’s production of new tank cars to meet improved safety standards, and to increase the efficiency of the fleet by use of more energy-efficient rail cars.

Preserving Jobs and Driving Investment

“The Freight RAILCAR Act will help incentivize private investment in the freight railcar manufacturing industry to preserve thousands of American jobs, reduce our carbon footprint, and ensure the integrity of our critical rail supply chains,” RSI’s Nicole Brewin said in a press release.

“Railway suppliers are facing increasingly difficult economic circumstances as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and many have been forced to significantly reduce their manufacturing workforces,” Brewin added. “We thank the [representatives] for introducing this bill to help restore and maintain the tens of thousands of jobs that depend on this industry and urge Congress to advance this legislation quickly to help railway suppliers cope with the economic fallout of this pandemic.”

Rail: Sustainable by Nature

• It produces fewer greenhouse gases (GHG). Greenhouse gas emissions are directly related to fuel consumption. Freight railroads account for just 0.6% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, according to EPA data, and just 2.1% of transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions, AAR reports. 

• It’s more fuel efficient than other options. Freight rail is ahead of other land modes of surface transportation when it comes to limiting its carbon footprint. U.S. freight railroads, on average, move one ton of freight more than 470 miles per gallon of fuel, the association notes. 

• It’s a sustainable choice. If 25% of the truck traffic moving at least 750 miles went by rail instead, annual greenhouse gas emissions would fall by approximately 13.1 million tons, AAR points out. If 50% of the truck traffic moving at least 750 miles went by rail instead, greenhouse gas emissions would fall by approximately 26.2 million tons. 

• It uses technology to improve efficiency. “From advanced locomotive technology to zero-emission cranes,” AAR states, “freight railroads leverage technology in all aspects of their operations to limit their impact on the environment.” In 2019, for instance, U.S. freight railroads consumed 656 million fewer gallons of fuel and emitted 7.3 million fewer tons of carbon dioxide than they would have if their fuel efficiency had remained constant since 2000. 

• It helps reduce highway congestion. According to AAR, one freight train can replace several hundred trucks, freeing up space on the highway for other motorists. “Shifting freight from trucks to rail also reduces highway wear and tear and the pressure to build costly new highways,” it adds.

Supporting Sustainable Supply Chains

By leveraging tracking information, the Global Control Tower provides analytics that measures key performance indicators (KPIs) like fleet cycle time, origin/destination dwell time, lane and hauler performance, back orders, freight spend, load optimization, and more. With their rate, equipment, lease, tracking, and invoice data in a central repository that’s accessible 24/7, companies can position themselves for success in any market conditions.

New HOS modifications that go into effect on September 29th expand the short-haul exception, expand the adverse driving conditions exception, require 30-minute breaks, and change the sleeper berth provision.

In June, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) announced changes to the hours of service (HOS) regulations, which are being revised to provide more flexibility for drivers without adversely affecting safety. The HOS rules regulate the number of hours commercial drivers can drive and work per day and week, and also include other restrictions (i.e., mandatory rest breaks). 

4 Key Changes to Know

Beginning September 29, 2020, these new HOS rule modifications go into effect: 

1. Short-haul Exception: Expands the short-haul exception to 150 air-miles and allows a 14-hour work shift to take place as part of the exception. 

2. Adverse Driving Conditions Exception: Expands the driving window during adverse driving conditions by up to an additional two hours. 

3. 30-Minute Break Requirement: Requires a 30-minute break after 8 hours of driving time (instead of on-duty time) and allows an on-duty/not driving period to qualify as the required break. 

4. Sleeper Berth Provision: Modifies the sleeper berth exception to allow a driver to meet the 10-hour minimum off-duty requirement by spending at least 7, rather than at least 8 hours of that period in the berth and a minimum off-duty period of at least two hours spent inside or outside the berth, provided the two periods total at least 10 hours, and that neither qualify period counts against the 14-hour driving window. 

All impacted motor carriers are required to comply with the new HOS regulations by the stated deadline. “All of those were provisions that we have heard about and had lots of discussions with the industry,” FMCSA’s Joseph DeLorenzo said at a recent industry meeting. “So this rule was really focused on the input that we received from everyone that’s been involved in the process from the drivers to the carriers, (agricultural) groups, and others.”

Getting ELDs Ready

In ELD Providers Prep for Upcoming HOS Changes, TruckingInfo details what electronic logging device (ELD) providers are doing to help carriers and drivers get ready for the new HOS changes. It says the new requirement that operators take a 30-minute break after no more than eight hours of consecutive driving will be the most impactful on the ELD front. That’s because the requirement can now be satisfied by the on-duty/not driving status (rather than off-duty status), or by simply stopping to fuel a vehicle at a gas station. 

Currently, drivers must take a 30-minute break after eight hours on-duty. The new rule says that the break must come after eight hours of driving time (not necessarily consecutive) without a 30-minute break. The break time itself can be now satisfied during on-duty, non-driving time. 

ELD providers are helping carriers work through these new requirements and ensure compliance. “To assist our customers with compliance with the changes in the federal hours of service regulations, we are updating codes on our various HOS compliance tools to allow drivers using Omnitracs ELDs to take advantage of this change in the rest break requirement,” Omnitracs’ Mike Ahart told TruckingInfo. 

Eroad, another ELD provider, approached the update in stages, first researching the attitudes and impacts of the changes with customers and the market, then designing and implementing changes, and finally communicating the changes and enabling customers to make the switch. 

“We conduct rigorous testing on behalf of our customers so that on Sept. 29, drivers aren’t facing bugs and issues, and carrier compliance managers aren’t looking at data they don’t understand,” Eroad’s Soona Lee told TruckingInfo. “We test complex scenarios in a driver’s day to trigger violations, check HOS counters, and make sure that the driver’s log data before the switchover is correct as much as it will be after that date.”

How it Impacts Driver and Carriers

The looming HOS changes will have a direct impact on carriers and individual drivers. According to Trucker,the motor carrier must record the driver’s time in, time out, and total hours per day, which must also include how many hours the driver has worked for the previous seven days. Those records are required to be kept by the carrier for six months. 

The records don’t have to be held on the vehicle, but law enforcement can request a copy of the records from the carrier if a driver is pulled over. Drivers who exceed these exceptions (i.e., driving too far or too many hours) must complete a regular log (if it only happens eight or fewer days within the last 30 days) or use an ELD (if the exceptions are not met more than eight days within the past 30). 

“The updated rule really tries to put it in the hands of the driver and tries to focus on the fact that the driver has to make this assessment after the last qualifying break,” DeLorenzo explained, “as opposed to the beginning of the trip, which the earlier definition had set.” 

To learn more about the upcoming changes to the HOS rules, visit the FCMSA’s website here.

Managing Transportation Effortlessly

IntelliTrans’ Global Control Tower provides high levels of supply chain transparency; aggregates, completes, and enhances data from a variety of sources; offers visibility into and execution of different aspects of the supply chain; and generates data-driven alerts and analytics that ask deeper questions and deliver meaningful insights. 

By leveraging tracking information, the Global Control Tower provides analytics that measures key performance indicators (KPIs) like fleet cycle time, origin/destination dwell time, lane and hauler performance, back orders, freight spend, load optimization, and more. With their rate, equipment, lease, tracking, and invoice data in a central repository that’s accessible 24/7, companies can position themselves for success in any market conditions.       

Automakers, tech startups, logistics providers, and carriers are coming together to help make the driverless truck a reality.

“As autonomous trucking edges closer to market, technology providers and their potential customers are testing competing strategies for how driverless big rigs could help them make money in the real world,” WSJ’s Jennifer Smith reports.  

“Several startups are building out prototype fleets and hauling freight for big shippers that hope autonomous trucks could help cut transportation costs and speed up deliveries,” she continues. “Other companies with self-driving trucking technology are trying to plug into existing operations, striking agreements with truck makers and large trucking fleets that they believe could eventually buy thousands of autonomous tractors.”

Key Progress Points

Through its Volvo Autonomous Solutions division, the auto maker is now developing the Vera, a prototype truly driverless truck with no cab. It is currently being tested towing containers from a logistics center in Gothenburg, Sweden, to a nearby port terminal, at up to 25mph.

Since then, companies have been making real progress on their other autonomous trucking initiatives. Here are some of the latest developments:

• Transport operators Ryder System Inc., NFI Industries Inc., and Deutsche Post AG are working with Ike Robotics Inc., to offer the latter’s automated trucking technology through a software subscription model. 

• Port trucking and intermodal provider NFI is assessing how autonomous trucks would integrate with its dedicated trucking operations moving freight from customers’ warehouses to retail stores. “Self-driving big rigs could handle longer highway portions of those regional runs, such as the 250-mile trip between the Dallas-Fort Worth area and Houston,” NFI’s Ike Brown told. 

• Waymo Via has begun testing autonomous trucks in Texas, using two of the country’s biggest freight hubs as testing grounds. The Class 8, Peterbilt 579 trucks are being tested out of the Dallas-Fort Worth area, running to El Paso via Interstates 20 and 10, and to Houston via Interstate 45, CDLLife Each truck is equipped with Waymo Driver sensors and cameras, but is manned by a real, human truck driver, who will manually drive the routes first before allowing the autonomous software to attempt the route without human intervention.    

• Locomation recently completed its first on-road pilot transporting commercial freight, VentureBeat In partnership with risk management consultancy Aon and Wilson Logistics, Locomation deployed two trucks hauling trailers in a driverless convoy on a 420-mile-long route. Its retrofitted trucks covered approximately 3,400 miles and operated autonomously roughly half of the time, delivering 14 commercial loads (Locomation’s system requires at least one driver to be alert and in control at all times).

The Next Logical Leap

“With this pandemic, the industry faces issues such as driver shortage and severe commodity demand triggered by panic shopping,” the research firm adds. “Autonomous vehicles (AVs) offer a solution to both the aforementioned with the capability of driving longer hours and safely.”

Logistics and shipping operators alike have been given a strong case for including self-driving trucks in their fleets, with safety rising to the top in most of those conversations. According to ResearchAndMarkets, North America and Europe are leading the global autonomous truck transition, with many industry stakeholders based out of or testing vehicles in these regions. 

“Cross-brand platooning trials were conducted in European test beds to understand the applicability scope of the technology. Many cities are upgrading their underlying infrastructure to enable V2V and V2X transmissions needed for trucks to operate autonomously. Government-funded initiatives with collaborative efforts from multiple and diverse industry participants are being done to fast-track the development of autonomous trucks.” 

Because autonomous trucks wouldn’t be bound by rules that limit most commercial drivers to 11 hours behind the wheel, they can also help lower the costs, making over-the-road (OTR) service more competitive with intermodal rail-truck service. “I think automated trucking is going to bite into the intermodal market,” Brown told WSJ.

Supporting the Autonomous Supply Chain

By leveraging tracking information, the Global Control Tower provides analytics that measures key performance indicators (KPIs) like fleet cycle time, origin/destination dwell time, lane and hauler performance, back orders, freight spend, load optimization, and more. With their rate, equipment, lease, tracking, and invoice data in a central repository that’s accessible 24/7, companies can position themselves for success in any market conditions.