320 Chapter Thirteen International Land and Multimodal Transportation 321

Shipping companies have had to change their perspectives from that of simple
Figure 13-10
A U.S. Piggy-Back Train
Source. Photo © Chad Hewitt. Used with permission.
and engines; however, as of 2009, little progress had been made. Moreover, France
opposes opening its network despite the agreement, so a large, geographically
necessary swath of the network may not be available at all. Add to this information the
discrepancies of at least two railroad gauges, five electrical systems, and 16 signaling
systems, and the task seems daunting. The creation of the European Association for
Railway Interoperability in 1996, charged with creating a trans-European network of
high-speed passenger trains, has spurred cooperation between the national railroad
companies, and such effort should eventually be extended to freight transport.
Another possible development is the replacement of some ocean trade with rail
transportation, notably between the Far East (China, Korea) and Europe; such a
possibility would seriously shorten transit times between the two areas and relieve
some of the congestion in southern China's ports. Such a land bridge has been
extensively studied,16 but, despite its attractiveness, it is still more in conceptual stages
than ready for implementation as of September 2009.
transportation providers to that of providers of a multiplicity of services, one of which is
transportation in their core competency; such as ocean shipping. However, they also have
to provide transportation services in other modes, such as trucking or rail. In
addition, shipping companies now interact with their customers directly and offer
such ancillary services as tracking of shipments online. Most important of all,
intermodal service created the possibility for an exporter (or an importer) to have a
single interlocutor in a complex international shipment involving more than one
mode of transportation. This "one-stop" shopping is probably what has made
intermodal transportation so popular with shippers.
Because of the ubiquitous use of the seagoing container in multimodal shipments, the
term intermodal has also been strongly associated with this transportation
concept. The container idea is fairly recent. It was created in 1956 by Malcom
McLean in an attempt to eliminate the large number of handlings to which ocean
cargo was subjected, and to speed up the loading and unloading of ships. This concept of
container has been a smashing success, with more than 10.7 million TEUs (20-foot
equivalent units) in use worldwide.17
Certainly, the use of containers allowed the concept of intermodality to develop,
but the two concepts are not entwined. It is quite possible to have an intermodal
shipment that is not packaged in a container, and it is possible to use only one mode of
transportation to ship containerized cargo. Nevertheless, the two are strongly tied
together, and probably 95 percent of all intermodal cargo is shipped in containers, of
which there are many different types. In addition, that percentage is growing, as more
container types have been created to allow nonstandard cargo to be containerized.
Movable Boxes
International commerce was completely changed by the The labor costs would be lower, as the laborers loading
arrival of the container.18 the containers would be inland and not part of the strong
Before containers, the traditional method for loading (and costly) longshoremen's unions.
and unloading a ship was a very time-consuming and Containers of different sizes had been proposed
labor-intensive process. Goods, in boxes small enough to several times before, but it was Malcom McLean, the
he handled by humans, were loaded by cranes onto break- owner of a trucking company, who eventually made the
bulk ships. Gangs of longshoremen were responsible for first investment in movable boxes of a size similar to a

multimodal A shipment that
takes several different means of
transportation from its point of
departure (seller/exporter) to
its point of destination ( buyer/
importer).
13-3 Intermodal Transportation
Probably the best way to introduce intermodal transportation is to define the concept:
Intermodal describes a shipment that takes several different means of transportation—
road, rail, ocean, air—from its point of departure (seller/exporter) to its point of
destination (buyer/importer). The meaning has evolved recently to limit the use of
this term to freight for which a single bill of lading covering more than one of these
alternatives is issued.
Intermodal transportation is therefore not a means of transportation per se, but
instead is the practice of utilizing a single bill of lading to cover several means of
transportation for a single shipment. For that reason, it is also called multimodal
transportation or co-modality. To use a recent cliche, the changes in means of
transportation are "transparent" to the user, which means that the shipper does not
have to worry about them, but only needs to be aware of them, so as to pack
accordingly. The responsibility of arranging for all of the means of transportation falls
onto the shipping company.
stowing them into the ship and making sure that they
would not be damaged during the ocean voyage. They had to
make sure that heavy goods Were lower in the hold than
lighter goods, that the weight of the cargo was distributed
correctly through the ship, and that every piece of cargo
was wedged solidly against the others. It was back-
breaking, dangerous work. Because a ship could not be
loaded until it had completely been unloaded, it took days to
perform both operations. As trade increased, there was
evermore gridlock in the ports, and ocean shipping was
agonizingly slow.
Containers revolutionized this system; containers
would be loaded, once, in the plant that manufactured
the product, and unloaded, once, in the plant of the
customer. There was no intermediary handling, no chance for
pilferage, no possible damage from mishandling.
truck trailer and shipped them from Newark to Houston in
April 1956. He eventually expanded this concept to other
U.S. routes: the West Coast to Hawaii, Miami to Puerto
Rico.
McLean's greatest challenges were with the unions of
the ports in which he set up his operations; while West
Coast ports' unions embraced the system, the East Coast
unions were more difficult to convince. He also had
difficulties convincing port authorities to invest in cranes
and docks; in particular the Port of New York was
unwilling to invest in docks that were wide enough to
allow trucks to come alongside ships. Eventually, the
movable container prevailed, as all began to understand
the benefits of the concept.
In the late 1950s, containers were everywhere in the
United States, except that they were of different sizes;
continued