Other Commodities

Progressive Rail Specialized Logistics is your single source contact for moving heavy commodities by rail. Leave the hassle of dealing with railroads to us. From port, plant, or warehouse we will coordinate ordering the right equipment from the railroads and professional loading of your merchandise. From there your shipment is continually monitored until final delivery. Origin and destination drayage can be arranged via one of our trucking partners.

Typical Products Moved:

Steel and Metal Products
Pipe
Refractories
Coiled Wire and Tube
Scrap Materials

Benefits of Using Rail:
Utilizing rail can be that competitive advantage you have been looking for. With fuel efficiency over three times that of trucks and larger payloads, savings can be significant.

Rail’s fuel efficiency saves money in times of high fuel prices.
Rail can carry heavier loads - often a 3 trucks to 1 railcar conversion or more. We helped one customer achieve considerable savings through a 5 trucks to 1 railcar conversion.
Rail’s increased flexibility for loading and unloading can save on driver delay charges.
Rail reduces reliance on trucking constrained by driver shortages and equipment unavailability.

Benefits of Using Us:
So you don’t understand mileage allowance on private equipment, 417-waybills, light bad orders, or trailing point switches?

We do and we can help. We understand railroad communications, procedures, and operations.

Progressive Rail Specialized Logistics is owned by a short line railroad, and nearly all our people have worked in the railroad and transportation industry for many years. We put this hard-earned knowledge to work for you.

We offer:

Daily tracking reports on all loads and empties. Soon, we will be able to generate reports based on your unique identifier such as serial number – not just railcar number.
Estimated Time of Arrival for most lanes.
Rail-shipping department management.
Railcars. Through our parent company, we can supply customers’ rail equipment needs through sale or lease.
Paperwork management. We produce the Bill of Ladings, pay the freight bills, and deal with any communications with the railroads and truckers.

Points to Remember:
In the greater Chicago area, there are numerous mills and metal service centers. Rail rates and availability of specific equipment types may vary by facility as different railroads service different mills. Likewise terminals within a single port may be served by different railroads.

To avoid unexpected problems please consult with any broker regarding origination points. When using toll processors, ask if your product will be shipped from a subcontractor or warehouse at a different location than the processor.

If in doubt, we can help you research the origination point. Remember we are here to help.

When shipping beams, we need to know if gussets or any other weldments will be present on the beams.