Commercial Carrier Journal (www.ccjdigital.com) and TruckingInfo.com both recently ran stories highlighting TCP Survey data from the 4th Quarter Business Expectations Survey.
The survey showed a large majority of carriers expecting to grow capacity, and many moving to replace their aging vehicles.
The new hours-of-service rules have resulted in lower utilization of equipment. As a result, carriers are being pushed to increase capacity and raise driver pay.
The number of carriers indicating they are not going to add capacity has been trending down, and is now at its lowest level yet for the TCP survey, at just 27 percent.
Larger carriers expected to be more aggressive in adding equipment than smaller carriers. Thirty-nine percent of larger carriers expected to add between 5% to 15% compared with only 27% of smaller carriers.
“We suspect that all the 2007 pre-buy tractors are being traded out. If smaller carriers are not able to replace older, less fuel-efficient equipment (and their higher maintenance costs), those carriers will not be well positioned to benefit from looming good times,” says TCP Partner Richard Mikes.
TruckingInfo.com Article: http://www.truckinginfo.com/news/story/2014/01/capacity-growth-an-inevitable-result-of-lowered-utilization.aspx
Commercial Carrier Journal Article: http://www.ccjdigital.com/monday-money-carriers-to-add-capacity-freight-indices-mixed-union-votes/
