Intermodal shipping provides not only a cost savings to our customers, but more reliable and consistent service for cross-country shipments. Western Intermodal's standard service includes picking up material at a customer's facility and delivering it to one of our Intermodal Service Centers where the material is loaded into a container or van and shuttled to the rail for transportation across the country to yet another one of our intermodal services centers. The shipment is then unloaded from the container or van and delivered on a flat bed truck to the final consignee. Western Intermodal also provides Import and Export services as well as warehousing and a menu of value added services for our customers.
In the beginning transloading material into a container or van was not involved. Western Intermodal picked material up on a flat bed carrier and brought it to a securing location, where additional blocking and tarping was done to accommodate rail requirements. Today as an alternative to flatbeds, Western Intermodal uses marine dry-box containers as rail shipping devices.
As intermodal shipping became more popular in the metals industry, new intermodal companies sprung up with less experience and started shipping. Derailments caused by coil shipments increased significantly, and a few rail lines banned them. Because of Western Intermodal's experience and outstanding track record shipping coiled metal products, the railroad companies requested that Western Intermodal work with them to develop the rules that are now part of the coil shipping process still in effect today.