CGR Transport - Horizon Freight System Seattle Agent

12/26/2025

12/22/2025

As we wrap gifts, stock our fridges, and prepare for the holidays, it’s easy to forget how everything gets there. Behind every present under the tree and every grocery store shelf stocked is a truck driver putting in long hours on the road.

Through busy schedules, winter weather, and time away from home, truck drivers keep the holidays moving. Without them, there wouldn’t be gifts to give or meals to share.

To our drivers, we cannot thank you enough. Your hard work and commitment don’t go unnoticed, and we’re extremely lucky to have each and every one of you on our team. While it’s been a challenging year for the trucking industry, we’re proud to work alongside some of the most experienced and professional drivers in the business. We couldn’t do it without you.

03/27/2025

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12/18/2024

Trucking companies are invited to join Zoom meeting this Friday and discuss the upcoming NWSA Gate Efficiency Program (new $15‼️ per appointment fee).

Pease register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN__k-hm8hsRQCi_LaqqvZSvQ #/registration

06/06/2023

--- USWC disruptions continue as ILWU flexes power amid wage, manning gap with employers ---

US West Coast longshore labor is flexing its power to seek significantly higher wages and manning changes that would put two workers rather than one on some port equipment, sources said Monday, continuing a fourth day of disruptions at some marine terminals.

Several container terminals were hit with job actions in Seattle, Long Beach and Los Angeles on Monday, according to sources. While the severity of port disruptions on Monday was less than on Friday when dockworkers shut down a number of terminals along the coast from Long Beach to Seattle, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) are still far apart on salary and manning levels, according to four sources close to the negotiations.

One operator at a Los Angeles marine terminal said he didn’t receive any of the labor he requested from the ILWU hiring hall on Monday, adding, “We probably will idle the ship today.”

A spokesperson for SSA Marine said labor gangs working four vessels in Seattle were fired on Monday because of low productivity on the cranes. SSA, which operates three terminals in Long Beach, said two of the terminals there have not worked an international ship since Saturday.

The sporadic ILWU job actions that continued over the weekend have included slowing down ship-to-shore crane productivity from the normal 25 to 26 lifts per crane per hour to about 20 lifts per hour, or even lower.

The PMA slammed the ILWU in a statement Monday for continuing “concerted and disruptive work actions.”

“Union leaders are implementing many familiar disruption tactics from their job action playbook, including refusing to dispatch workers to marine terminals, slowing operations, and making unfounded health and safety claims,” PMA said. “The ILWU’s coast-wide work actions since June 2 are forcing retailers, manufacturers and other shippers to shift cargo away from the West Coast in favor of ports on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Much of the diverted cargo may never return to the West Coast.”

The ILWU declined to comment. But the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) issued a statement saying it “stands in solidarity” with the ILWU, claiming the union has been “disparaged by the PMA through a calculated media campaign designed to boost its contractual leverage at the expense of West Coast dockworkers.”

Spokespersons at port authorities said most of their terminals that were affected Friday and over the weekend received full labor allocations for Monday’s day shift.

--- White House monitoring situation ---

During a briefing Monday, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the Biden administration was monitoring contract negotiations closely and pointed to both sides tentatively agreeing on undisclosed “certain key issues.” The White House was “going to continue to encourage all parties to work in good faith toward a mutually beneficial resolution that ensures that workers get fair benefits, equality of life and the wages they deserve," Jean-Pierre said.

The job actions taking place on the West Coast in recent days prompted the National Retail Federation (NRF) on Monday to send its third letter to the Biden administration urging federal intervention in the negotiations between the ILWU and the PMA, which represents shipping lines and terminal operators, since the coastwide contract negotiations began in May 2022.

“As we enter the peak shipping season for the holidays, these additional disruptions will force retailers and other important shipping partners to continue to shift cargo away from the West Coast ports until a new labor contract is established,” David French, the NRF’s senior vice president of government relations, said in a letter to the Biden administration. “It is imperative that the parties return to the negotiating table. We urge the administration to mediate to ensure the parties quickly finalize a new contract without additional disruptions.”

--- Union seeking significant salary hike ---

Negotiations are said to be hung up over an unprecedented demand by the ILWU for a wage increase of $7.50 per hour for each year of the proposed six-year contract, which would increase longshore wages by close to 100% over the life of the contract. Two sources close to the talks confirmed the union’s wage demand.

By comparison, wage increases over the past 20 years have been in the range of 50 cents to $1.50 per hour for each year of the contract, according to the PMA’s annual report.

The ILWU is looking to take advantage of the record profits carriers booked in 2021 and 2022 amid pandemic-induced disruption in the global supply chain that came amid historic import levels from Asia and massive consumer spending. But those profits have since diminished as the ocean shipping market returned to normalcy with consumers pulling back on spending their discretionary income on merchandise.

The ILWU is also reportedly demanding that certain cargo-handling equipment, such as yard tractors, be assigned to two dockworkers. That has long been a practice with ship-to-shore cranes, which require a higher level of skill. Under the ILWU’s demand, two drivers would be assigned to each yard tractor, which means one longshoreman would work for four hours and get paid for eight, and the second longshoreman would work the remaining four hours of the shift and get paid for eight.

Another significant issue in the negotiations involves retroactive pay, sources say. In each contract negotiation, there has been an unspoken agreement between the PMA and ILWU that whatever wage increase is agreed upon in the new contract, it would be retroactive back to the expiration of the previous contract, a source told the Journal of Commerce. That means the PMA and ILWU have been operating under the assumption that the wage increase being discussed for the new contract would be retroactive to July 1, 2022, when the prior deal expired.

But with negotiations now past the one-year mark, the PMA has reportedly told the ILWU that retroactive pay will be off the table as of July 1 if a tentative contract is not reached by then, according to the source. That PMA strategy is designed to provide a sense of urgency so the ILWU will reach an agreement soon rather than dragging the negotiations out further, the source said.

Terminal operators told the Journal of Commerce that if ILWU job actions stopped and cargo handling went smoothly Monday, coastwide negotiations between the union and PMA would resume on Tuesday. But it’s uncertain if that will happen now.

Source: JOC.com

12/30/2022

Happy New Year from all of us at CGR Transport!

12/08/2022

-- US import declines to accelerate into 2023: retailers --

US retailers are forecasting a significant decline in imports at least into next spring, saying Wednesday the normal winter lull in the eastbound trans-Pacific will be especially pronounced in the coming months. That comes as demand craters, driven in part by an earlier-than-normal holiday shipping season.

“The volume of imported container cargo at the ports we cover has declined, and the next six months will see further declines to a level not seen for some time,” Ben Hackett, founder of Hackett Associates, said in the December Global Port Tracker (GPT).

GPT, which is published monthly by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates, tracks imports through 12 major US ports. The December report continued GPT’s trend of downgrading its forecast for US imports into 2023.

Imports in December are forecast to decline 7.2 percent from December 2021, up from the 9 percent decline forecast in the November GPT. Imports in January are now expected to drop 8.8 percent from January 2022, compared with the previous forecast of an 8.4 percent decline. February’s imports are forecast to plunge 20.9 percent year over year compared with the previous estimate of 19.1 percent, while imports in March are now expected to fall 18.6 percent, compared with the previous estimate of a 15.1 percent drop.

Imports are forecast to decline 13.8 percent year over year in April; it is GPT’s initial forecast for the month.

US imports grew strongly in the first half of the year as many retailers shipped fall and holiday merchandise earlier than usual owing to concerns over port congestion and inland supply chain bottlenecks. US imports from Asia in January through June increased 6 percent from the first half of 2021, according to PIERS, a JOC.com sister product within S&P Global. Asian imports then declined 4.6 percent in July, 1 percent in August, 27.8 percent in September, and 16 percent in October compared with the same months last year, according to PIERS.

-- Concern mounts over West Coast labor talks --

Port congestion on the West Coast is not the issue it was earlier this year. That is due largely to a significant shift in imports to the East and Gulf coasts as contract negotiations between the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and terminal operators have continued well beyond the July 1 expiration of the previous contract. Retailers are concerned about the failure of the two parties to finalize a contract, and how these uncertainties will impact cargo routing going forward.

“It’s time to settle on a labor contract for West Coast ports and address other supply chain issues that remain so the lull doesn’t become the calm before a storm,” Jonathan Gold, the NRF’s vice president for supply chain and customs policy, said in a statement accompanying the GPT.

Source: JOC

09/15/2022

-- Confidence waning as ports, rails prepare for strike --

The prospects of heading off a crippling rail strike in the US later this week appeared to dim Wednesday even as the Biden administration brought management and two holdout unions to Washington for face-to-face talks.

Hopes for a resolution were raised early Wednesday when the White House revealed that Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh was hosting railroad management and unions for talks at the Labor Department. A strike or lockout can happen just after midnight on Friday.

“Secretary Walsh continues to lead discussions at the Department of Labor between the rail companies and unions,” a Labor Department spokesperson told JOC.com in a statement Wednesday. “The parties are negotiating in good faith and have committed to staying at the table.”

But the positive momentum was stalled when the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) District 19 announced Wednesday that its 4,900 members had voted to reject a tentative agreement reached Aug. 29 with the National Carriers’ Conference Committee (NCCC). The news was a particular blow because IAM’s leadership had previously signaled their approval of the tentative deal.

“The railroads will work with the IAM to determine next steps,” the NCCC said in a statement. “The parties have agreed to maintain the status quo pending current discussions.”

Two other unions — the Transportation Communications Union and the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen — ratified their agreements on Wednesday.

However, the country’s two largest rail unions — the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) and Sheet Metal Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD) — have shown no inclination thus far to accept the recommendations of the Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) that was created in July — a 22 percent wage increase covering 2020 through 2024 and a total of $5,000 in bonus payments. Sources have told JOC.com that work conditions and lifestyle concerns, rather than compensation, are the main obstacle to a deal at this point.

The PEB urged the unions to drop their proposals on sick time and work conditions from the national contract talks and work through the local grievance and arbitration process to settle those issues.

-- Midterm elections at play --

The White House is particularly sensitive to the status of the talks because a strike or lockout by management that further hobbles an already stressed US supply chain would be hugely unhelpful to President Joe Biden and Congressional Democrats just six weeks away from crucial midterm elections.

“All parties need to stay at the table, bargaining in good faith to resolve outstanding issues and come to an agreement,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters during a televised briefing Wednesday. “A shutdown of our rail system is an unacceptable outcome for our economy and the American people, and all parties must work to avoid just that.”

Jean-Pierre tamped down, at least for now, expectations that Congressional Democrats would ride to the rescue. Republican Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina and Roger Wicker of Mississippi on Monday introduced a resolution that would halt a strike or lockout and codify the recommendations of the PEB, but Senator Bernie Sanders blocked the bill on the floor Wednesday. Congress does have power to halt labor action and force an agreement on the parties.

But “this is an issue that can and should be worked out between the rail companies and the union, not Congress,” Jean-Pierre said.

-- Rails, ports make contingency plans --

Meanwhile, BNSF Railway announced its intermodal contingency plans for a potential strike. Shippers will not be able to bring trailers or containers into BNSF Cicero and Corwith in Chicago, BNSF Memphis, or BNSF Seattle effective Friday. But the western US railroad will allow truckers to come into all terminals to pick up and deliver containers arriving before any work stoppage.

BNSF will continue to accept outbound loads in all its other terminals.

Norfolk Southern Railway stopped accepting outbound intermodal loads on Wednesday at all terminals.

Union Pacific Railroad announced that it will run trains through Thursday evening. If there is a work stoppage, UP said intermodal terminals will accept containers on Friday but stop accepting containers beginning Saturday. UP said trucks will be allowed to pick up and deliver containers to shippers even if intermodal service is suspended.

CSX Transportation has not announced its operating plan yet.

The South Carolina Ports Authority stopped accepting export loads at Inland Port Greer at 3:00 pm local time on Wednesday, ahead of Norfolk Southern Railway closing gates Wednesday evening. Truckers can still pick up import containers arriving before Friday and empty containers will be accepted in Greer through any rail shutdown, the port authority said.

The final train will leave Inland Port Dillon to Charleston on CSX at 3:00 pm local time on Thursday. Exports will be accepted in Dillon during any strike or lockout, but no trains will arrive or depart.

“SC Ports has capacity on its marine terminals and rail-served inland ports — particularly at Inland Port Dillon and Leatherman Terminal — to serve our customers if a disruption occurs,” the port authority said in a service advisory Wednesday.

The Georgia Ports Authority will continue to accept exports at the Appalachian Regional Port even if trains stop running, a port authority spokesperson told JOC.com. CSX has committed to running trains between Savannah and Chatsworth, Georgia, through Thursday, the port authority said.

-- Shippers start turning to truckers --

Shippers are reportedly scrambling to secure assets such as tractors and trailers and looking for assurance from third-party logistics providers (3PLs) that truck capacity will be available if a rail strike takes place.

“Customers primarily want to be assured there’s capacity to switch freight from rail to truck if they need to, which is something we’re constantly doing — sometimes for price, sometimes for speed, and especially during times of disruption like hurricanes,” Tim Humbert, vice president of North American intermodal at logistics provider C.H. Robinson Worldwide, told JOC.com.

The problem is, “there’s not enough capacity out there,” Greg Orr, president of CFI, a Joplin, Missouri- based truckload carrier recently acquired by Heartland Express, told JOC.com Wednesday.

Before Tuesday, only one shipper had called CFI looking for help to move freight normally shipped by rail, he said. By Wednesday morning, that number had grown to 10 of CFI’s top 25 customers. “Our customer service floor is a lot more active,” he said.

“The railroads are shifting from serving customers to repositioning assets, and we’ve been advising that anything that is critical to ship, get it out now,” said Mike Regan, chief relationship officer at TranzAct Technologies and a member of the National Industrial Transportation League board of directors.

Shippers are likely to turn to asset-based contractual partners first, Regan said.

CFI’s Orr says there are “pockets” of capacity available in contract networks, including his own, but the locations of those pockets vary from week to week. “There might be additional capacity in the Pacific Northwest one week, but not the next,” he said. “It’s been a little more volatile than it’s been in the past.”

If anything, truckload capacity and demand seems closer to a balance than they have in years. That could change quickly if rail unions go on strike, said Orr.

04/14/2022

Seattle jobs dispute sets uneasy tone ahead of ILWU-employer talks.

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) says West Coast employers have reneged on a 2008 deal that paved the way for automated cargo handling to be introduced at marine terminals, a source of friction as the talks get under way on May 12.

The union argues that in return for the terminals’ ability to automate, which since 2008 has resulted in four terminals installing automated cargo handling, employers agreed to defend in any legal proceedings the ILWU’s jurisdiction over maintenance and repair jobs against competing claims to that work by other unions. But according to the union, employers failed to do that in a dispute over several such jobs at a Seattle terminal, leading ILWU workers to be replaced by workers of another union, the International Association of Machinists.

The dispute at the SSA-operated Terminal 5 facility at the Port of Seattle was ostensibly settled through litigation at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), where rulings favored the machinist union and included a judge on March 5 ordering dockworkers to cease and desist from engaging in actions to re-claim the disputed jobs.

But two sources have told JOC.com that simmering discontent by dockworkers over that outcome could flare up during what are expected to be months-long negotiations with the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA), the coastwide employer group, to replace the existing contract that expires on July 1.

“The situation at T5 with SSA is about them not fulfilling their side of the contractual agreement when it comes to the assignment of work to ILWU,” Cam Williams, ILWU Coast Committeeman, told JOC.com. “By SSA not holding up their end of the agreement and the PMA not reinforcing it, it is our view [as well as an independent arbitrator's] that the section of the contract related to automation is being violated, which raises a question of its current viability.”

--- Disruption fears fuel cargo shift ---

Fears about potential disruption associated with the negotiations — disruption has accompanied every West Coast longshore labor negotiation going back to the 1990s — has led shippers in recent months to divert thousands of containers to ports in Canada and on the US East and Gulf coasts with less perceived labor risk, driving West Coast market share to a record low of less than 60% in January and February.

Biden administration officials, worried about negative political fallout from higher inflation due to supply chain issues, are closely monitoring the scenario and have repeatedly offered to mediate to avoid further disruption.

Although the issue at the T5 terminal focuses on competing jurisdictional claims at a single terminal in Seattle, it has coastwide significance given the union’s view that employers’ obligation to defend ILWU maintenance and repair (M&R) work in jurisdictional disputes was at the heart of the 2008 deal that allowed employers to automate cargo handling at West Coast terminals.

Given the union’s growing ideological opposition to automation, which was on display in huge protests the union staged in 2019 to oppose plans by APM Terminals to automate cargo handling at its Pier 400 terminal in Los Angeles, any opening to question the 2008 agreement — even if narrowly focused on a specific dispute like the one in Seattle — could be seized upon by the union in the negotiations. Employers say other issues were at play; they say they paid for the right to automate in the form of enhanced compensation to union members that will amount to over $800 million between 2008 and the expiration of the existing contract on July 1.

Maintenance and repair jobs are at the heart of the Seattle dispute and were a key focus for the union in the 2008 talks. In that contract, employers agreed the ILWU would represent M&R jobs at any new terminal, but terminals along the coast that already employed workers from the International Association of Machinists (IAM) would be able to continue to employ those workers.

A caveat was that if an IAM-manned terminal closed it would lose its status as protected for IAM workers. Thus, when the T5 terminal in Seattle, which was operated by APL and using the IAM for M&R work, closed in 2013 and was mostly unused for several years, new terminal operator SSA employed ILWU workers when it re-opened the terminal in 2019 as per the requirement of the 2008 contract.

However, in early 2019, the IAM threatened to picket at T5, citing its own existing collective bargaining agreement with SSA that gives it the right to “all M&R work” at SSA facilities in the Puget Sound area. That led to the dispute going before the NLRB to resolve the competing unions’ claims to the work.

It was at that point, the ILWU says, when the 2008 “quid pro quo” for automation in return for guarantees it would represent M&R workers at new or re-opened terminals such as T5 fell apart.

The reason was that in the NLRB proceeding, according to the ILWU, SSA, and the Pacific Maritime Association did not “defend” the ILWU jurisdiction for M&R work against competing claims by other unions as it was obligated to do in the 2008 contract.

--- SSA preference for IAM workers ---

According to the March 5 NLRB ruling awarding the disputed jurisdiction to the IAM, the NLRB inferred SSA’s preference for IAM workers given that SSA said it “would have used [IAM represented mechanics] we already had working for us” at other terminals in Seattle. As a result of that ruling, SSA in the fall of 2020 began assigning M&R work at T5 work to IAM members.

According to the coast arbitrator who heard the ILWU’s protest of the work being assigned to IAM members, the 2008 contract clause obligating employers to defend the ILWU’s claims to M&R jurisdiction in legal disputes “is a material and indispensable part of the parties’ quid pro quo and bargain for the employers contractual ability to undertake automation on the terms described in the [2008 contract].” The violation of that, according to the arbitrator, “nullifies the bargain concerning automation.”

It emerged from the NLRB opinion that there were questions over ILWU workers’ practical ability to perform M&R work at T5, helping to explain SSA’s preference for IAM workers with whom it had a long-standing working relationship and who had the experience to maintain terminal equipment, including gantry cranes. “ILWU-represented mechanics never performed M&R work for the employer at the Port of Seattle,” the opinion said, noting “ILWU’s failure to establish a union-wide level of skills and training; and IAM mechanics had more experience handling Terminal 5’s cranes.”

According to the NLRB opinion, the PMA argued that, in light of the focus of the 2008 contact on jurisdiction, “it been increasing ILWU’s jurisdiction at West Coast ports in exchange for the right to automate and mechanize equipment,” noting that PMA members increased ILWU mechanic shifts from zero in 2007 to 25,501 in 2019.

Nevertheless, the ILWU signaled that the issue is hardly one they see as closed.

Source: https://www.joc.com/maritime-news/labor/seattle-jobs-dispute-sets-uneasy-tone-ahead-ilwu-employer-talks_20220412.html

08/01/2021

This article leaves out another important factor, which is overall lack of flexibility at warehouses when it comes to receiving and shipping cargo.

Many warehouses have receiving hours that are 9am-2pm or even as little as 8:30-11am, which is completely unrealistic if you want to maintain a flow when it comes to moving import cargo. Another common trend is appointment times for local deliveries, typically in the late afternoon, which simply doesn’t work for drayage drivers. We also frequently are told that the warehouses don’t have labor working there, they have to bring in temporary hired labor, in which case they cannot take the containers for extended periods of time meaning the containers then need to be stored in the truckers yard. Not only does this slow the supply chain down by feeding the equipment shortage problem, but it also results in an astronomical increase in cost for any local delivery.

In recent months, the average cost of a local move has more than doubled, and truthfully the rates still do not adequately compensate what is asked of not only the drivers, but the dispatchers and office staff handling operations in container drayage trucking companies. This significant increase will ultimately only cost each and every one of us as consumers when prices are raised on the products being imported.

Anyone just joining the workforce and looking for entry level job, looking for a job that pays more or better fits your lifestyle, or contemplating a career change should consider a looking in the transportation and logistics industry. Whether it’s a warehouse, getting your class A CDL to become a truck driver, or an office position of some kind, hard working, motivated people are needed. These are not easy jobs, but I think people fail to acknowledge and appreciate just how important these jobs are when it comes to keeping the economy and our world moving.

Port jams and congested supply chains make drayage life grueling for those on the ground, and drivers are fleeing in droves.