ATA Weighs Rail Debate Involvement

Should American Trucking Associations get involved in the debate over railroad competitive access? That’s the question ATA’s board of directors will consider at its winter meeting next week in San Francisco.

Congress has stumbled on the issue of forcing railroads to let competing rail carriers use their tracks. Railroad executives consider competitive access a life-or-death issue and say they strongly opposeany efforts to change the existing law on who gets access when and at what price.

Attempts to deal with the question derailed last year’s legislation for reauthorizing the Surface Transportation Board, which oversees rail matters.

“Competitive access will likely be considered in this Congress, so we have placed it on the agenda for our winter meeting in San Francisco,” said ATA President Walter B. McCormick Jr., calling it one of the biggest transportation issues since rail and trucking deregulation.

For the full story, see the Feb. 8 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.