Interesting Facts you may not know about the trucking industry
Trucks move more freight domestically than any other form of transportation. Just last year trucks hauled 11.84 billion Tons of freight in the USA representing more than an estimated 140 billion miles driven annually and generating 791 Billion dollars in revenue!
While intermodal rail, ocean and air are important modes of transportation as well, none offers the versatility and directness that trucking does.
Trucks move freight of any kind imaginable with many types of trucks designed for different types of cargo. The most common type of truck seen on the roads is the dry van, which most will recognize as your “standard tractor trailer”. Other types of common trucks include flat beds, hoppers, refrigerated trucks, tankers and intermodal drayage trucks.
Here are some interesting facts that many may not know about the trucking industry.
Truck drivers typically drive well over 100,000 miles per year with many driving about 125,000 miles annually! Which equates to around 2,000-3,000 miles per week . Many truck drivers drive over 300 days per year which can be a tough lifestyle. The US trucking industry drives in total around 140 billion miles each year! 40+% of all miles drive in the US are by commercial trucks. Some truck drivers with long careers have driven over 5 million miles through the decades!
Trucks generally burn around 20,000 gallons of diesel fuel per year! Only commercial buses beat trucks, averaging higher consumption per vehicle per year. For trucks, this equates to an average fuel consumption of around 6 mpg while some more modern and more efficient trucks reach nearly 10 mpg.
Number of hours a truck driver drives
Federal regulations permit truck drivers to drive for 11 hours per day, or 70 hours in any 8 day period. This total over 4,000 hours per year of driving. Once the 70 hour limit is reached drivers must take a 34 hour off duty time from driving. These regulations are to ensure drivers are well rested and safe behind the wheel. Without these regulations many companies would likely push drivers to drive beyond the safe limit, which would reduce safety standards and increase accident rates.
Trucking is a male dominated industry with women representing only 6.7% of US truck drivers, however minorities account for a little over 40% of drivers.
The standard dry van truck has a cargo load space of 53’ long X 8.5’ ft X 8.5ft with a load capacity of typically 45,000 lbs which equates to around 26 standard pallets in most configurations. Most trailers have a smooth wood floor which makes use of forklifts or other pallet handling equipment easy. Some are equipped with power lift gates which allows freight to be loaded or unloaded at facilities that don’t have loading docks.
Intermodal trucking – international & Domestic
Intermodal trucking is the process of providing first or last mile trucking services to move containers that have been shipped via rail or ocean for the long haul portion of the trip. Intermodal is one of the most efficient and green forms of supply chain logistics, as railroads are around 4x more efficient than trucks, and drastically reduce emissions on long haul trips. One example of a route that would be common for intermodal would be Los Angeles to Chicago. In this example, a container would be unloaded off a ship coming from China or Vietnam, then an intermodal drayage truck would transport the container to a rail yard from the port at this point the container would travel by rail on a double stack train to Chicago. In Chicago the container would be unloaded from the train via massive cranes and onto an intermodal truck for the final leg of its journey to a warehouse or distribution center.
Cross border trucking
The passing of the recent USMCA trade agreement as a replacement for the decades old NAFTA represents the ongoing importance of north American trade between Canada, Mexico and the United States. US Trade just with Mexico was over 600 Billion dollars in 2018, with the signing of the USMCA and the recent political tensions with China this number will likely climb dramatically over the next few years as more and more companies prefer to “near shore”. Cross border trucking companies are the main method of transportation that facilitates this trade between mexico and the US and between the US and Canada. Rail services also provide shippers the ability to ship massive amount of freight via intermodal which is more cost efficient on long haul trips. Trucking is still the dominant form of cross border transportation. For example freight heading from Mexico to Chicago or Atlanta would very likely move via cross border Mexico intermodal rail services.
Trucking Represents nearly 6% of all full jobs in the country which is millions of jobs. This is higher than the GDP of many nations.
97% of trucking companies are small businesses that operate twenty or fewer trucks, with many being owner operators.
29% of truck drivers are between the ages of 45-55, while only 5% are between 20-24 years old!
This will and is leading to a shortage of truck drivers, with many trucking companies trying harder than ever to recruit new younger drivers.
Most trucks have 400 to 600 horse power depending on make and model
The average salary for truck drivers is between 40 and 65 thousand per year depending on company, experience and type of trucking.
Famous truck manufacturer, Mack trucks, was founded in 1900 but didn’t make it’s first truck until 1907. Early trucks from this time were more like powered horse drawn wagons that what we think of today as trucks. They were also very challenging to drive as the had very narrow tires and no power steering. Other trucks from this time included vehicles made by Ford, International harvester, Buick and Avery.
Many economics and planners estimate the amount of total freight tonnage will grow to 20.6 billion tons by 2030 which is a 25% increase. Freight revenues will grow over 50%. However trucking’s market share of the freight industry will drop slightly as more emissions regulations are passed, fuel prices rise in the long term and more cities invest heavily in rail intermodal for long haul freight, which reduces city congestion. Industry experts estimate that by or before 2030 trucking revenues will total over 1 Trillion dollars in the United States alone.
The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has shown the world just how important truck drivers are to keeping your local grocery store’s shelves stocked. Next time you see a truck driver, give him a thank you for the long and tiring hours he or she works to keep food on your table and toilet paper in the closet… !
This country literally could not function without our truck drivers.
Recommended for further reading:
https://www.trucking.org/news-insights/trucking-moved-1184-billion-tons-freight-2019
https://www.trucks.com/2019/08/29/freight-revenue-soar-trucking-share-declines/
