Apr 27, 2006 9:34 AM, from staff and wire reports

Union Pacific Railroad has signed a strategic agreement with the Ocean Carrier Equipment Management Association (OCEMA) to launch the rail industry’s first inland cooperative truck chassis pool in the United States.

Under the agreement, 16 international customers that belong to the new co-op will consolidate their truck chassis—the frame on wheels to which an intermodal container is secured for truck transport—into a fleet that will be managed in a “chassis pool.” The chassis pool manager is responsible for inspection, maintenance, repairs, interchange, and inventory control. This will help reduce the cost of customers having to purchase and track their own individual chassis.

The co-op truck chassis pool was established in December 2005 at the Denver Intermodal Facility. Its benefits include:

•Reduction in the truck chassis inventory.

•Reduction in labor managing the chassis fleet.

•Terminal efficiencies such as improved over-the-road driver turn time, improvements in train arrivals, and less time spent unloading containers.

Union Pacific plans to expand the co-op chassis pool model to 11 more sites in the next two years, totaling about 70,000 truck chassis. Near-term, it will implement chassis pools at intermodal facilities in Salt Lake City UT and Marion AR.