This Is What the Pandemic Did to the U.S. Rail System
Odd Lots
Bloomberg
4.5 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 27 September 2021
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The pandemic has obviously sent shockwaves throughout the supply chain. And, despite hopes of normalization, things might even be getting worse. The number of ships, for example, waiting to unload at the Port of Los Angeles has continued to grow. And it seems like every day another company talks about various shortages. So what does it mean for our commercial rail system? On this episode, we speak with Ian Jefferies, the President and CEO of the Association of American Railroads, to discuss the state of rail, how the industry has adapted, and the work it will take to get things back to normal.
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| 0:43.8 | Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odlots podcast. I'm Joe Weissenthal. |
| 1:00.4 | And I'm Tracy Allaway. So Tracy, I mean, you know, it's actually been a little while, I guess, |
| 1:07.2 | since we've done one of our pure logistics episodes. Earlier in the summer, we were doing a lot. |
| 1:12.9 | We've done a lot all year. I just feel like, you know, we've probably gone at least three or |
| 1:18.0 | four without coming back to what is without a doubt the story of 2021. When you say more than a little |
| 1:25.3 | bit, or it's been a while, I mean, we did do the semiconductor episode, like the other week, |
| 1:30.4 | which I kind of file under the shortages and bottlenecks. Yeah, true. But I guess it's true. |
| 1:36.7 | It is true. We haven't done a transport episode in a while. And there are some big ones that we |
| 1:44.1 | haven't addressed just yet. And I'm thinking specifically of pallets and barges. But of course, |
| 1:50.2 | the biggest transport mode that we have yet to talk about and the issues taking place there, |
| 1:55.4 | it has to be rail. And it's come up quite a bit when we were talking to Jean Soroco, |
| 2:02.5 | that the head of the Port of Los Angeles, for instance, whenever we've been talking about gridlock |
| 2:07.1 | in transport generally, we do tend to touch on rail and some of the issues there. But we haven't |
| 2:14.0 | talked about it in depth yet. Right. So we kind of have taken this, you know, end-to-end approach, |
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