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The day’s most important moves across every mode — air, rail, road, ocean and the trade that ties them together.
| ● On the Wire |
Wednesday, October 7 |
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Port Houston is investing in infrastructure like expanding the Houston Ship Channel to support larger ships and more efficient flow of cargo.
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Ocean
BY STUART CHIRLS · AMERICAN SHIPPER · OCTOBER 6, 2026
Xeneta says Asia–U.S. spot rates have hit their post-Hormuz-crisis high, but its chief analyst expects only a gradual slide rather than a collapse, with East Coast rates settling in the $6,000–$7,000 per FEU range.
| THE TAKE — Rates that are still more than four times their pre-crisis levels leave plenty of room to fall without anything resembling a collapse, which is exactly Xeneta’s point. The widening East Coast premium — $3,177 per FEU over the West Coast versus $772 before the crisis — suggests shippers are paying heavily for routing certainty, and that premium is likely the first piece to compress. For importers budgeting through year-end, the more useful number is the forecast floor: even a meaningful decline leaves East Coast rates well above where they started the year. |
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Rail
Shintech, the largest U.S. PVC producer, told the Surface Transportation Board that single-line service from the Union Pacific–Norfolk Southern combination would improve speed, cost and competition for its eastern markets.
| THE TAKE — Shintech is a telling supporter because Union Pacific already carries all of its rail traffic from three Gulf Coast plants, so the benefit it’s describing is reaching eastern customers without an interchange handoff. That makes the filing a concrete shipper case for the merger’s single-line promise rather than a generic endorsement. The counterweight in the same docket — a veteran railroader warning of harm to short lines and their customers — shows the STB will be weighing large-shipper gains against smaller-carrier risks. |
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Air Cargo
Air Transport Services Group agreed to sell Omni Air to a buyer group led by its founder and a former Sun Country CEO, clearing the way for owner Stonepeak to close its Chicago parking meter concession.
| THE TAKE — The sale is less a strategic airline story than a political one: Chicago council members tied approval of Stonepeak’s roughly $2.5 billion parking concession to Omni Air’s ICE deportation flights, and divesting the carrier was the price of getting the deal done. The unusual detail is the buyer vehicle, which was registered just days before the announcement, underscoring how fast the deal came together. For ATSG, shedding an 11-aircraft passenger charter operation sharpens its focus on core air cargo, which its CEO framed as the real upside. |
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Last-Mile
Uber agreed to buy workplace catering platform ezCater in an all-cash deal, while Uber Freight hired a former YMX Logistics COO and Kraft Heinz executive to lead customer onboarding for its transportation management business.
| THE TAKE — EzCater’s average order value north of $400 is the real draw: it’s a high-ticket, repeat-business segment that looks very different from typical food delivery, and the platform is already profitable on a non-GAAP basis. The Uber Freight hire is a smaller item but a pointed one — putting someone with both a 3PL and a shipper background in charge of onboarding suggests Uber sees implementation speed as a competitive lever in transportation management. Regulatory approval is the main thing standing between the catering deal and a close in the coming months. |
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OCT 27–28, 2026 · THE SIGNAL, CHATTANOOGA, TN
FreightWaves’ flagship event blends rapid-fire tech demos and world-class speakers with the most legendary networking in logistics. Join 1,000+ freight and logistics experts, industry leaders, entrepreneurs and innovators for a definitive look at the year ahead. Come for the insights, stay for the celebration and leave with the connections that will define your 2027.
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American Shipper · The Daily — published weekdays
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