Cash Market Moves

Federal Maritime Commissioner Max Vekich spoke recently at the annual Transportation Go! conference on the importance of the Ocean Shipping Reform Act enacted last summer.

The announcement Wednesday that federal regulators have conditionally approved the marriage of Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern could move grain commodities from Canada and the upper Midwest through new export channels into the Gulf of Mexico.

Two tows pushing six barges each worked in tandem, breaking the ice on Lake Pepin to make their way to St. Paul to open the Upper Mississippi shipping season.

A bipartisan group of Senators recently introduced a new bill dealing with rail safety on top of other safety efforts being introduced and discussed.

Late into 2022, some cities on the Mississippi River and tributaries were still below-zero gauge. Recently, some of those spots are showing levels near minor flood stage.

Trucking groups sent a letter to Congress asking them to repeal a heavy-duty excise tax that was established in 1917.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered Norfolk Southern to clean up all remnants of the Ohio train derailment.

A disastrous train derailment in Ohio earlier this month has put railroad safety under a microscope.

Senators Bernie Sanders and Mike Braun held a press conference with rail union leaders demanding paid sick days for rail workers.

After the extreme low water conditions in the Mississippi River and tributaries during Fall 2022, most of the system has received beneficial moisture this winter, but some areas will need more.

There have been new developments in the proposed merger of CP and KCS merger, while West Coast dock workers still have no contract.

The last laker left Jan. 21, from Superior, Wisconsin, with the last load of taconite pellets to be shipped out of the Twin Ports until spring.

The Surface Transportation Board (STB) recently established a voluntary arbitration program and an entirely new procedure for rate challenges that has some railroads questioning the rule.

The last grain ship headed out of the Twin Ports right before Christmas and officially ended the 2023 grain shipping season.

The Surface Transportation Board held a two-day hearing in response to shipper complaints about the Union Pacific slowing service by using embargoes.

The Surface Transportation Board will hold an in-person public hearing with Union Pacific Railroad Company (UP) pertaining to the substantial increase of embargoes declared to reduce congestion.

USGC noted in their annual corn harvest report that there is an abundant amount of good quality corn entering the market from the 2022 U.S. crop.

The navigation season is over for the far Upper Mississippi River, while the Lower Mississippi is still in dire need of water.

Twelve rail unions have completed voting on the tentative national rail agreement with four unions voting no.

Flooded fields in mid-May caused farmers concern that the wheat crops may not get planted on time.