In the same note of tech in trucking, the large truck manufactures have started 'John Deere-ing' their equipment and making more electronically integrated, non user replicable, non-standard parts.
The newer parts typically are lighter, which means less fuel usage and room for actual cargo. At the same time, if the part breaks in 100,000 miles and costs an arm and a leg to replace the owner/operator doesn't gain anything but paying the manufacture more of an ownership tax.
The future of trucking probably involves neither truckers and nor any fuel. Battery electric trucks are already taking over. And autonomous driving trucks without a driver seems like it is a matter of time. That eliminates the two most expensive cost factors in trucking.
Of course this won't happen overnight. But it will probably be happening faster than some might expect. Cost saving potential is going to be the main reason. Trucks use a lot of fuel, and at the rate they are using it, it adds up to quite a lot of money. Tens of thousands of dollar per year. 50K$ is fairly average. The only thing more expensive is the driver. Getting rid of both, adds up to meaningful savings.
In Europe, China, Australia, etc. they are being widely used. Long distance trucks from the likes of Volvo are being sold as fast as they are being produced. The US is running a bit behind the rest of the world here.
Electrically propelled trucks are commercially available in every weight class, form factor, etc. that you can name. Companies selling those are doing brisk business and dealing with waiting lists for their products.
They are ready and good enough right now. I think the US (assuming you are basing your opinions on what's happening there) has some unique challenges of being a bit change and technology resistant. And of course it being a petro state is causing lots of misguided policy and incentives that are actively holding it back.
Both fuel and electricity prices vary of course, but generally yes it cuts your energy costs by at least half. Estimates for total cost are all over the place though - if nothing else battery vehicles are currently more expensive and need new infrastructure.
LTL (Less than load) will probably still have human drivers for high value time sensitive materials, but most things should be loaded onto a train and hauled close to their destination where a short truck can pick up from the train yard and haul the last few miles to the customer.
Of course, if we spent the money to build a few high speed cross country trains we could save so much money and reduce the environmental impact of thousands of 18 wheelers and their exhaust and tires and highway damage.
We would need 5 of them, one from Maine to Washington, one from Atlanta to Los Angeles, one from Los Angeles to Seattle, one from Miami to Bangor, Maine, and one from McAllen to Winnipeg, CA.
It's be a great way to spend $250 billion dollars and would make so many people wealthy and improve the lives of all Americans and many non-Americans in measurable ways.
Regular speed freight is fine for a lot of things but it is comparatively slow. It can take weeks for products on train lines to make it from California to New York, which would be bad for things like food.
Reefer (refrigerated) trucking is a HUGE portion of the trucking pie. If you could replace that with faster trains you could decrease the cost of foods (due to spoilage losses) while increasing its quality for the consumer.
Also, there's a decent amount of flight traffic that is just for mail. Running mail via high speed train would decrease pollution and still provide "good enough" speeds for a large majority of mail.
Further, it could improve the tourism of any intermediary hub cities it goes through, and provide healthy tax revenue and other financial boosts to middle america.
There are undoubtedly trillions of dollars on the table up for the grabs with something like a cross country high speed rail. as shown here:
Creates Jobs:
Building high-speed rail will create hundreds of thousands of jobs. Every $1 billion in investment creates 24,000 jobs. These are highly skilled jobs that will revitalize the domestic rail industries supplying transportation products and services. Many additional jobs are created through the commerce fostered through the economic activity and development which they spark.
Increases Economic Activity:
Every $1 invested creates $4 in economic benefits. Upgrading passenger operations on newly revitalized tracks, bridges and rights of way is spurring business productivity along corridors. The rail services will connect America’s economically vital mega-regions and help keep them mobile, productive, efficient and internationally competitive.
Reduces Congestion and Boosts Productivity:
Congestion on our nation’s roads costs $140 billion in lost time and productivity. The U.S. population is projected to grow by another 100 million people in the next 40 years. The population growth is creating mega-regions that will not prosper unless they can be freed from the stranglehold of highway and airport congestion. At the same time, the United States cannot build enough highway capacity or airport runways to meet demand.
Reduces the Nation’s Dependence on Foreign Oil:
Implementing high-speed rail will keep billions of dollars in the U.S. economy by decreasing the amount of oil that the U.S. consumes. According to the International Association of Railways (UIC), high-speed rail is eight times more energy efficient than airplanes and four times more efficient than automobile use. It will also decrease greenhouse gas emissions and improve air quality.
Expands Travel Choices and Improves Mobility:
High-speed rail can deliver people from one downtown to another as fast as or faster than air travel. The addition of HSR as an integrated part of America’s transportation system will help airports work better and highways work better. It will also expand options for citizens in rural and small urban communities with increased transfer points and feeder services that connect with new HSR corridors.
Terminal dwell time is a huge factor. Terminal dwell for Indianapolis for example is like 20 hours on average. Trains can be faster, sure, but there is a tremendous amount of time that a particular railcar will spend simply waiting to be assembled into a train, classified/sorted.
I wonder if we will see trucker on self driving truck violence during the switchover. My bet is yes. I think this will be the first space where those replaced physically fight back.
Waymos were trashed during the June protests in LA (against the Trump admin's immigration raids) though I never heard whether the vandals were people who make money by driving.
Uneasy is an understatement. The threat is looming and existential. Maybe some governments will draw lines in the sand, like how you still can't pump your own gas in New Jersey. But I'd bet 1000 to 1 that in 20 years truck driving will be a niche profession.
Recommend the book Data driven: truckers, technology, and the new workplace surveillance by Karen Levy:
> Long-haul truckers are the backbone of the American economy, transporting goods under grueling conditions and immense economic pressure. Truckers have long valued the day-to-day independence of their work, sharing a strong occupational identity rooted in a tradition of autonomy. Yet these workers increasingly find themselves under many watchful eyes. Data Driven examines how digital surveillance is upending life and work on the open road, and raises crucial questions about the role of data collection in broader systems of social control.
> Karen Levy takes readers inside a world few ever see, painting a bracing portrait of one of the last great American frontiers. Federal regulations now require truckers to buy and install digital monitors that capture data about their locations and behaviors. Intended to address the pervasive problem of trucker fatigue by regulating the number of hours driven each day, these devices support additional surveillance by trucking firms and other companies. Traveling from industry trade shows to law offices and truck-stop bars, Levy reveals how these invasive technologies are reconfiguring industry relationships and providing new tools for managerial and legal control—and how truckers are challenging and resisting them.
> Thanks to work from home, and other trends, workers are being electronically monitored by their bosses like never before. But some industries have had experience with this for awhile. Truck drivers, in particular, have been under legally-required electronic monitoring for several years now. Not only are their hours and miles electronically logged, increasingly they're subject to facial cameras and other types of body monitoring. On this episode, we speak with Karen Levy, a professor at Cornell and the author of "Data Driven: Truckers, Technology, and the New Workplace Surveillance" to discuss how surveillance works within the trucking industry, and what it means for everyone else.
Shameless Plug: I am building Proma.ai and one of the use cases we are pursuing is trucking freight operations management. I would love to chat with others in this space - both builders and buyers.
In the same note of tech in trucking, the large truck manufactures have started 'John Deere-ing' their equipment and making more electronically integrated, non user replicable, non-standard parts.
The newer parts typically are lighter, which means less fuel usage and room for actual cargo. At the same time, if the part breaks in 100,000 miles and costs an arm and a leg to replace the owner/operator doesn't gain anything but paying the manufacture more of an ownership tax.
the trucking market is so big, I wont be surprised if people would just make aftermarket parts.
If you have 3D printer or CNC machine or injection molding, these parts can be made DYI, to the spec.
for example Tesla charges $1000 to replace a broken passenger side mirror for model Y.
I got aftermarket mirror for $200. I think its a no brainer to use aftermarket part and dont pay 5x markup to the richest man on the planet
The future of trucking probably involves neither truckers and nor any fuel. Battery electric trucks are already taking over. And autonomous driving trucks without a driver seems like it is a matter of time. That eliminates the two most expensive cost factors in trucking.
Of course this won't happen overnight. But it will probably be happening faster than some might expect. Cost saving potential is going to be the main reason. Trucks use a lot of fuel, and at the rate they are using it, it adds up to quite a lot of money. Tens of thousands of dollar per year. 50K$ is fairly average. The only thing more expensive is the driver. Getting rid of both, adds up to meaningful savings.
Battery electric trucks aren’t ready for over over-the-road trucking. They hardly even make sense for drayage currently.
In Europe, China, Australia, etc. they are being widely used. Long distance trucks from the likes of Volvo are being sold as fast as they are being produced. The US is running a bit behind the rest of the world here.
Electrically propelled trucks are commercially available in every weight class, form factor, etc. that you can name. Companies selling those are doing brisk business and dealing with waiting lists for their products.
They are ready and good enough right now. I think the US (assuming you are basing your opinions on what's happening there) has some unique challenges of being a bit change and technology resistant. And of course it being a petro state is causing lots of misguided policy and incentives that are actively holding it back.
Yet
Is the electricity meaningfully cheaper?
Both fuel and electricity prices vary of course, but generally yes it cuts your energy costs by at least half. Estimates for total cost are all over the place though - if nothing else battery vehicles are currently more expensive and need new infrastructure.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/389462793_The_Costs...
Yes, even when diesel is subsidized with trillions in debt.
Yes.
Within a margin of error, yeah.
LTL (Less than load) will probably still have human drivers for high value time sensitive materials, but most things should be loaded onto a train and hauled close to their destination where a short truck can pick up from the train yard and haul the last few miles to the customer.
Of course, if we spent the money to build a few high speed cross country trains we could save so much money and reduce the environmental impact of thousands of 18 wheelers and their exhaust and tires and highway damage.
We would need 5 of them, one from Maine to Washington, one from Atlanta to Los Angeles, one from Los Angeles to Seattle, one from Miami to Bangor, Maine, and one from McAllen to Winnipeg, CA.
It's be a great way to spend $250 billion dollars and would make so many people wealthy and improve the lives of all Americans and many non-Americans in measurable ways.
The U.S. has the best freight rail system in the world, it passenger rail sucks. Why spend money on freight rail?
Regular speed freight is fine for a lot of things but it is comparatively slow. It can take weeks for products on train lines to make it from California to New York, which would be bad for things like food.
Reefer (refrigerated) trucking is a HUGE portion of the trucking pie. If you could replace that with faster trains you could decrease the cost of foods (due to spoilage losses) while increasing its quality for the consumer.
Also, there's a decent amount of flight traffic that is just for mail. Running mail via high speed train would decrease pollution and still provide "good enough" speeds for a large majority of mail.
Further, it could improve the tourism of any intermediary hub cities it goes through, and provide healthy tax revenue and other financial boosts to middle america.
There are undoubtedly trillions of dollars on the table up for the grabs with something like a cross country high speed rail. as shown here:
Creates Jobs: Building high-speed rail will create hundreds of thousands of jobs. Every $1 billion in investment creates 24,000 jobs. These are highly skilled jobs that will revitalize the domestic rail industries supplying transportation products and services. Many additional jobs are created through the commerce fostered through the economic activity and development which they spark.
Increases Economic Activity: Every $1 invested creates $4 in economic benefits. Upgrading passenger operations on newly revitalized tracks, bridges and rights of way is spurring business productivity along corridors. The rail services will connect America’s economically vital mega-regions and help keep them mobile, productive, efficient and internationally competitive.
Reduces Congestion and Boosts Productivity: Congestion on our nation’s roads costs $140 billion in lost time and productivity. The U.S. population is projected to grow by another 100 million people in the next 40 years. The population growth is creating mega-regions that will not prosper unless they can be freed from the stranglehold of highway and airport congestion. At the same time, the United States cannot build enough highway capacity or airport runways to meet demand.
Reduces the Nation’s Dependence on Foreign Oil: Implementing high-speed rail will keep billions of dollars in the U.S. economy by decreasing the amount of oil that the U.S. consumes. According to the International Association of Railways (UIC), high-speed rail is eight times more energy efficient than airplanes and four times more efficient than automobile use. It will also decrease greenhouse gas emissions and improve air quality.
Expands Travel Choices and Improves Mobility: High-speed rail can deliver people from one downtown to another as fast as or faster than air travel. The addition of HSR as an integrated part of America’s transportation system will help airports work better and highways work better. It will also expand options for citizens in rural and small urban communities with increased transfer points and feeder services that connect with new HSR corridors.
https://www.apta.com/research-technical-resources/high-speed...
Terminal dwell time is a huge factor. Terminal dwell for Indianapolis for example is like 20 hours on average. Trains can be faster, sure, but there is a tremendous amount of time that a particular railcar will spend simply waiting to be assembled into a train, classified/sorted.
How many countries use HSR for freight around the world? From what I understand, it's literally 0 right now.
I wonder if we will see trucker on self driving truck violence during the switchover. My bet is yes. I think this will be the first space where those replaced physically fight back.
Waymos were trashed during the June protests in LA (against the Trump admin's immigration raids) though I never heard whether the vandals were people who make money by driving.
IIRC, this was a response to reports that Waymo was handing over camera data to the feds on request.
People won't be fired. Hiring will just slow. It won't be overnight and it won't be quick.
To truck drivers that own their own trucks I think 'fired' and 'just slow due to self driving' is a distinction without a difference.
Uneasy is an understatement. The threat is looming and existential. Maybe some governments will draw lines in the sand, like how you still can't pump your own gas in New Jersey. But I'd bet 1000 to 1 that in 20 years truck driving will be a niche profession.
Recommend the book Data driven: truckers, technology, and the new workplace surveillance by Karen Levy:
> Long-haul truckers are the backbone of the American economy, transporting goods under grueling conditions and immense economic pressure. Truckers have long valued the day-to-day independence of their work, sharing a strong occupational identity rooted in a tradition of autonomy. Yet these workers increasingly find themselves under many watchful eyes. Data Driven examines how digital surveillance is upending life and work on the open road, and raises crucial questions about the role of data collection in broader systems of social control.
> Karen Levy takes readers inside a world few ever see, painting a bracing portrait of one of the last great American frontiers. Federal regulations now require truckers to buy and install digital monitors that capture data about their locations and behaviors. Intended to address the pervasive problem of trucker fatigue by regulating the number of hours driven each day, these devices support additional surveillance by trucking firms and other companies. Traveling from industry trade shows to law offices and truck-stop bars, Levy reveals how these invasive technologies are reconfiguring industry relationships and providing new tools for managerial and legal control—and how truckers are challenging and resisting them.
* https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691175300/da...
Interview on Bloomberg's Odd Lots podcast:
> Thanks to work from home, and other trends, workers are being electronically monitored by their bosses like never before. But some industries have had experience with this for awhile. Truck drivers, in particular, have been under legally-required electronic monitoring for several years now. Not only are their hours and miles electronically logged, increasingly they're subject to facial cameras and other types of body monitoring. On this episode, we speak with Karen Levy, a professor at Cornell and the author of "Data Driven: Truckers, Technology, and the New Workplace Surveillance" to discuss how surveillance works within the trucking industry, and what it means for everyone else.
* https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-truckers-already-...
* Also: http://archive.is/https://www.newyorker.com/culture/annals-o...
Shameless Plug: I am building Proma.ai and one of the use cases we are pursuing is trucking freight operations management. I would love to chat with others in this space - both builders and buyers.