Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
Rail crucial to inland port
Intermodal access could spur investment in facilities, says CentrePort CEO
M.L. GRAY / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Enlarge Image
A BNSF Railway locomotive sits at the intermodal raid facility in Fort Worth, Texas, one of several such facilities it operates in the United States.
CentrePort Canada's initial project may be the construction of a highway but Diane Gray believes the key to the success of the inland port will be the development of a rail access strategy.
Gray, the CEO of CentrePort, recently returned from a tour of inland port facilities in the U.S. where she learned firsthand the crucial role intermodal rail facilities play.
"When we went down and visited a number of inland ports in the U.S. we saw the catalyst role rail played in terms of creating investment by manufacturers and distribution and warehouse operations," Gray said.
Intermodal rail facilities are a key feature in the operations of CenterPoint Intermodal Center in Joliet, Ill., SmartPort in Kansas City and Alliance Global Logistics Hub in Fort Worth, Texas.
Among other things, the U.S. tour underlined the significant role BNSF Railway plays in those inland ports with intermodal facilities in each one of them.
The Fort Worth-based railway also happens to run line into Winnipeg, the only U.S. railroad to do so. BNSF also has long-standing relationships with Canadian National and Canadian Pacific to run its cars on the Canadian railways' lines.
"Clearly we are a rail city already," she said. "The key for us at CentrePort Canada is rail engagement and that includes how the three Class 1 carriers access Winnipeg."
That means, she said, not just how they might access CentrePort, but how rail cars move around Winnipeg.
It has been suggested in the past that an intermodal facility at CentrePort would be an important addition to the operations, but Gray said she is not chasing CN or CP to relocate their Winnipeg yards to CentrePort's airport location.
But the fact that BNSF is present at the other inland ports down the mid-continent corridor -- in Chicago, Kansas City and Fort Worth -- may make Winnipeg a potential future development site for it.
"It would be extremely premature to say were are in talks with them about building that," Gray said.
"What we are talking with them about is to let them know what we are developing in Winnipeg. We're reaching out to them to say, well, is there a way to be engaged in a more substantive way."
For instance BNSF does not have an intermodal facility here but, she said, it also probably does not carry enough freight in Winnipeg to warrant one, either.
Gray has already broached the idea of a larger study of the rail assets with the provincial government.
She said that the solution to getting containers in and out of CentrePort and connecting them with existing intermodal facilities might be found using short-line carriers and "hook and pull" operations.
"The question is how do you best get containers that customers would generate out of CentrePort or that are destined to CentrePort to those intermodal yards," she said. "That is part of a whole strategy we will work on with government."
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition January 2, 2010 B4
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