The Georgia Ports Authority and the South Carolina Ports Authority collaborate on chassis issue

The Georgia Ports Authority and the South Carolina Ports Authority have filed an agreement with the Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) to work jointly to provide a new chassis pool structure to be known as the Southern States Chassis Pool. 

According to South Carolina Ports Authority president and CEO Jim Newsome the chassis pool was formed in 2006 as a way to more efficiently handle the provision of chassis for the movement of containers in the Southeast. 

“Today, this pool provides about 40 percent of the chassis offered in CCM managed pools,” he said in a statement.

Spokesmen added that while this pool has historically been an effective solution to chassis provision, as the current fleet is both aging and has not kept up in size with the growth of containerized trade in the Southeast. 

Furthermore, chassis provision is increasingly fragmented in the market as about 40 percent of the container moves are handled by chassis provided outside of the pool structure.

This pool will be operated by the North American Chassis Pool Cooperative (NACPC) which is a “trucker-centric” organization that has focused from its inception on improving the quality of chassis on an at-cost basis. 

There are three major goals in this collective effort:

*Significantly improve the quality of the chassis fleet in the Southeast through setting standards in terms of age and attributes, such as radial tires, LED lights, and anti-lock brakes.

*Grow the size of the chassis pool to keep up with the steady growth in containerized trade in the Southeast, both in terms of number of chassis and more realistic trigger levels for the injection of new chassis.

*Provide an “at cost” model per day of use which removes the current economic discontinuities which apparently exist between the various segments in the market that use chassis services.

Some prominent industry analysts suggest that the chassis issue is finally getting the attention it deserves.

Daniel Smith, Principal, The Tioga Group, Inc. told LM in an interview that the “trucker centric” aspect is key.

“Chassis are pieces of highway equipment, and ultimately it makes sense for them to be managed from the trucker side,” he said. “Every other segment of the trucking industry works that way, with operators providing most of the equipment and the balance provided by pools or leasing companies.”