Regional News : MidWest

A shortage of Russian grain due to a devastating drought and wild fires in that country has generated a substantial uptake in North American grain exports via the St. Lawrence Seaway. According to Marine Delivers, a bi-national industry coalition administered by the American Great Lakes Ports Association in the United States and Canada’s Chamber of Marine Commerce, grain shipments through...

The inland waterways industry was left high and dry in President Obama’s announcement Monday that he will ask Congress to approve a more than $50 billion long-term spending plan for roads, railways and runways. In a statement on Thursday, Cornel Martin, president and chief executive officer for the Waterways Council, said the industry was “disappointed and puzzled” by the Obama administra...

Norfolk Southern opened its Heartland Corridor on Thursday with a ceremony at the recently enlarged Cowan Tunnel near Radford, Va., with a doublestack container train pulling 200 containers to the Midwest. "Demand for rail freight service in the U.S. is expected to nearly double by 2035, and that's on a national transportation network that everyone agrees already is sorely stressed,” said...

Highway fatalities involving commercial trucks declined 20 percent to 3,380 from 4,245 in 2009, the lowest number since the Department of Transportation began tracking the data in 1975. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration touted stepped up enforcement and safety awareness efforts for the improved results, but there were also fewer trucks on the road as the recession reduced fr...

Locke The U.S. government reported Thursday that international trade in goods and services for July increased 1.8 percent to $153.3 billion from the June 2010 level, while imports decreased 2.1 percent over the same monthly period to $196.1 billion. “The increase in exports and narrowing of the trade deficit underline how critical exports are to our continued economic growth and why the Co...

The U.S. Grains Council has appointed Rebecca Bratter to director of development, effective October. Bratter will work with the council to develop strategies and manage programs to obtain market access and foster sales of U.S. grain and grain products in specific emerging international markets. She comes to the council from the U.S. Wheat Associates where she served as the director of...

The U.S. Navy and Navy League voiced their opposition to legislative attempts on Capitol Hill earlier this year to repeal the Jones Act, a law that requires the use of U.S.-flagged, crewed and built vessels in domestic U.S. waterborne trades. “For decades, U.S. merchant mariners have provided essential support for the U.S. Navy during times of war and national crisis,” the Navy said. “Rep...

The U.S. Federal Maritime Commission has received 22 license applications and changes for review. The FMC has received non-vessel-operating common carrier license applications from Car Go Worldwide, Compton, Calif. (Lionel Perera, president); Providence Shipping Group, Imperial Beach, Calif. (Jessica A. Drewnowski, vice president of chartering and operations); Sino United Link Corp., Plac...

President Barack Obama in a Labor Day speech in Milwaukee outlined an ambitious six-year agenda for investing in transportation infrastructure as a way to help create construction jobs and lay the foundation for long-term economic growth. He called for rebuilding 150,000 miles of roads, laying or repairing 4,000 miles of rail lines; restoring 150 miles of runways; funding the Next Genera...

Echo Global Logistics, a Chicago-based third-party logistics firm, has named Michael Mobley as senior vice president of operations and Marty Sinicrope as vice president of station sales. Mobley has more than 20 years of operations, supply chain management, and large-scale software implementation experience, having recently served as vice president of supply chain for Omron Healthcare. ...

Import cargo volume at the nation’s major retail container ports is expected to rise 16 percent in September over the same month last year, but 2010 has already hit its peak and numbers will decline through the rest of the year, according to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released Tuesday by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates. “Retailers have stocked up early on...

Schneider Logistics last week said it has arranged to hive off its forwarding and customs brokerage business in the United States and China in a sale to Norbert Dentressangle, a large freight forwarding, road transport and logistics company based in Lyon, France. The planned sale encompasses seven offices in the United States (San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Miami, Atlanta...

The Association of American Railroads (AAR) said Thursday that weekly rail traffic posted their highest numbers for 2010 in both rail carloads and intermodal volume for the week ending Aug. 28. U.S. railroads originated 302,358 carloads for the week, up 5.8 percent compared with the same week in 2009, but down 11.3 percent from the same week in 2008. Intermodal traffic totaled 237,194...

Kansas City Southern said Thursday its rail network has fully recovered from the impacts of Hurricane Alex and related tropical storms that interrupted service on its system in Mexico. KCS said it projects near 20 percent revenue growth in the second half of 2010. “August volumes represent the highest number of monthly carloadings to-date in 2010" and were 13.7 percent over August 200...

A preliminary determination by the U.S. Commerce Department’s Import Administration has found that $514 million of aluminum products imported from China in 2009 were unfairly subsidized. As a result of the preliminary determination, importers of Chinese aluminum extrusions will be required to post cash deposits or bonds at rates determined by the Import Administration. If Commerce makes a...

The U.S. Commerce Department will lead a trade mission to Baghdad, Iraq, in October. Francisco Sánchez, undersecretary of commerce for international trade, will lead the mission, which will include about 15 U.S. companies. This will be the first trade mission to Iraq since the end of the U.S. combat mission in Iraq. Some of the companies included in the mission will be America Cargo T...

Jim Eckler has retired as chief executive officer of SCI Group, but will continue as non-executive vice chairman, according his voice mail message. John Ferguson, vice president for international logistics at Schneider Logistics, will replace Eckler on Sept. 7, a spokeswoman for the company confirmed. Toronto-based SCI is part of the Canada Post group of companies, which includes Puro...

Norfolk Southern Corp. said it plans to open the Heartland Corridor next week after completing a three-year project to upgrade its rail route between Hampton Roads, Va., and Chicago by modifying 28 tunnels and other facilities to accommodate double-stack containers. Set to open Sept. 9, the new gateway will eliminate about 250 route miles and a day or more of transit time from current tra...

A congressional watchdog agency said the Commerce Department’s Commercial Service requires better management controls if it’s going to successfully help the White House achieve its goal of doubling U.S. exports in the next five years. The Government Accountability Office found the Commercial Service’s workforce has declined about 14 percent from its peak in 2004 through attrition -- “affe...

Weber Distribution, a Santa Fe Springs, Calif.-based logistics services provider, has named Dan Gayford to vice president client solutions for consumer packaged goods. Gayford joins Weber with 26 years of experience in supply chain sales and operations. He was director of business development for MW Logistics, and also held management positions at Ryder Integrated Logistics, Menlo Worldwi...

Federal Maritime Commission Chairman Richard A. Lidinsky has forwarded a wide-ranging set of recommendations for revising the Shipping Act of 1984 to the House Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation. Lidinsky Included in the recommendations to committee Chairman Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, R-Md., are six proposals: • Bring container and chassis lessors within the ambit of...

While export control reform is well underway in the United States, the Obama administration on Tuesday warned exporters that enforcement of the regulations remains a top priority. The reform, announced by the White House on April 20, calls for significant changes to the way the federal government processes export licenses for controlled U.S.-made military and commercial items. The plan al...

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security wants input from the industry to develop an updated set of proposed best practices for how companies may avoid becoming involved in the illicit transit, transshipment and re-export of items subject to the Export Administration Regulations. BIS said it’s especially interested in receiving industry feedback regarding new transshipmen...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture said the nation will export $107.5 billion in agricultural commodities in fiscal year 2010, the second-highest year on record. “This a $3 billion increase from the May forecast, and an $11 billion increase over last year. And agriculture is one of the only major sectors of the American economy with a trade surplus -- expected to be $30.5 billion this yea...

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday launched a new organizational performance management system. The system, FDA-TRACK, will monitor more than 100 FDA program offices through data from key performance measures established each year. That data will be gathered monthly, analyzed and presented each quarter to FDA’s senior management. The public will also be able to track this da...