Container Revolution
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Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using intermodal containers (also called shipping containers and ISO containers). Containerization is also referred as "Container Stuffing" or "Container Loading", which is the process of unitization of cargoes in exports. Containerization is the predominant form of unitization of export cargoes, as opposed to other systems such as the barge system or palletization. The containers have standardized dimensions. They can be loaded and unloaded, stacked, transported efficiently over long distances, and transferred from one mode of transport to another— container ships, rail transport flatcars, and semi-trailer trucks—without being opened. The handling system is completely mechanized so that all handling is done with cranes and special forklift trucks. All containers are numbered and tracked using computerized systems. Containerization originated several centuries ago but was not well developed or widely applied until after World War II, when it dramatically reduced the costs of transport, supported the post-war boom in international trade, and was a major element in globalization. Containerization eliminated manual sorting of most shipments and the need for dockfront warehouses. It displaced many thousands of dock workers who formerly handled break bulk cargo. Containerization reduced congestion in ports, significantly shortened shipping time, and reduced losses from damage and theft. Containers can be made from a wide range of materials such as steel, fibre-reinforced polymer, aluminum or a combination. Containers made from weathering steel are used to minimize maintenance needs.


Origin

Before containerization, goods were usually handled manually as break bulk cargo. Typically, goods would be loaded onto a vehicle from the factory and taken to a port warehouse where they would be offloaded and stored awaiting the next vessel. When the vessel arrived, they would be moved to the side of the ship along with other cargo to be lowered or carried into the hold and packed by dock workers. The ship might call at several other ports before off-loading a given consignment of cargo. Each port visit would delay the delivery of other cargo. Delivered cargo might then have been offloaded into another warehouse before being picked up and delivered to its destination. Multiple handling and delays made transport costly, time-consuming and unreliable. Containerization has its origins in early coal mining regions in England beginning in the late 18th century. In 1766 James Brindley designed the box boat 'Starvationer' with ten wooden containers, to transport coal from Worsley Delph (quarry) to Manchester by Bridgewater Canal. In 1795, Benjamin Outram opened the Little Eaton Gangway, upon which coal was carried in
wagons A wagon or waggon is a heavy four-wheeled vehicle pulled by draught animals or on occasion by humans, used for transporting goods, commodities, agricultural materials, supplies and sometimes people. Wagons are immediately distinguished from ...
built at his Butterley Ironwork. The horse-drawn wheeled wagons on the gangway took the form of containers, which, loaded with coal, could be transshipped from canal barges on the Derby Canal, which Outram had also promoted. By the 1830s, railroads on several continents were carrying containers that could be transferred to other modes of transport. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway in the UK was one of these. "Simple rectangular timber boxes, four to a wagon, they were used to convey coal from the Lancashire collieries to Liverpool, where they were transferred to horse-drawn carts by crane." Originally used for moving coal on and off barges, "loose boxes" were used to containerize coal from the late 1780s, at places like the Bridgewater Canal. By the 1840s, iron boxes were in use as well as wooden ones. The early 1900s saw the adoption of closed container boxes designed for movement between road and rail.


Twentieth century

On 17 May 1917, Benjamin Franklin Fitch inaugurated exploitation of an experimental installation for transfer of the containers called demountable bodies based on his design in Cincinnati, Ohio in the US. Later in 1919, his system was extended to over 200 containers serving 21 railway stations with 14 freight trucks. In 1919, Stanisław Rodowicz, an engineer, developed the first draft of the container system in Poland. In 1920, he built a prototype of the biaxial wagon. The Polish-Bolshevik War stopped development of the container system in Poland. The US Post Office contracted with the New York Central Railroad to move mail via containers in May 1921. In 1930, the
Chicago & Northwestern Railroad The Chicago and North Western was a Class I railroad in the Midwestern United States. It was also known as the "North Western". The railroad operated more than of track at the turn of the 20th century, and over of track in seven states befor ...
began shipping containers between Chicago and Milwaukee. Their efforts ended in the spring of 1931 when the
Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to eliminat ...
disallowed the use of a flat rate for the containers. In 1926, a regular connection of the luxury passenger train from London to Paris, Golden Arrow/ Fleche d'Or, by Southern Railway and , began. For transport of passengers' baggage four containers were used. These containers were loaded in London or Paris and carried to ports, Dover or Calais, on flat cars in the UK and "CIWL Pullman Golden Arrow Fourgon of CIWL" in France. At the Second World Motor Transport Congress in Rome, September 1928, Italian senator
Silvio Crespi Silvio Benigno Crespi (24 September 1868 in Milan – 15 January 1944 in Cadorago) was an Italian entrepreneur, inventor and politician. Firstborn of Cristoforo Benigno Crespi and Pia Travelli. He succeeded his father in running the firm of Cres ...
proposed the use of containers for road and railway transport systems, using collaboration rather than competition. This would be done under the auspices of an international organ similar to the Sleeping Car Company, which provided international carriage of passengers in sleeping wagons. In 1928
Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...
(PRR) started regular container service in the northeast US. After the Wall Street Crash of 1929 in
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
and the subsequent Great Depression, many countries were without any means to transport cargo. The railroads were sought as a possibility to transport cargo, and there was an opportunity to bring containers into broader use. In February 1931 the first container ship was launched. It was called the Autocarrier, owned by Southern Railway UK. It had 21 slots for containers of Southern Railway. Under auspices of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris in
Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400  ...
on September 30, 1931, on one of the platforms of the Maritime Station (Mole di Ponente), practical tests assessed the best construction for European containers as part of an international competition. In 1931, in the US Benjamin Franklin Fitch designed the two largest and heaviest containers in existence. One measured by by with a capacity of in , and a second measured by by , with a capacity of in . In November 1932 in Enola, PA the first
container terminal A container port or container terminal is a facility where cargo containers are transshipped between different transport vehicles, for onward transportation. The transshipment may be between container ships and land vehicles, for example train ...
in the world was opened by the
Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...
. The Fitch hooking system was used for reloading of the containers. The development of containerization was created in Europe and the US as a way to revitalize rail companies after the Wall Street Crash of 1929, which had caused economic collapse and reduction in use of all modes of transport. In 1933 in Europe under the auspices of the International Chamber of Commerce the
International Container Bureau The Bureau International des Containers et du Transport Intermodal (originally french: Bureau International des Conteneurs, still abbreviated BIC, en, International Container Bureau) oversees standards for intermodal containers, commonly referred ...
(French: ''Bureau International des Conteneurs'', B.I.C.) was established. In June 1933, the B.I.C. decided on obligatory parameters for containers used in international traffic. Containers handled by means of lifting gear, such as cranes, overhead conveyors, etc. for traveling elevators (group I containers), constructed after July 1, 1933. Obligatory Regulations: * Clause 1. Containers are, as regards form, either of the closed or the open type, and, as regards capacity, either of the heavy or the light type. * Clause 2. The loading capacity of containers must be such that their total weight (load, plus tare) is: for containers of the heavy type; for containers of the light type; a tolerance of 5 percent excess on the total weight is allowable under the same conditions as for wagon loads. In April 1935 BIC established a second standard for European containers: From 1926 to 1947 in the US, the
Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railway The Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railroad (reporting mark CNSM), also known as the North Shore Line, was an interurban railroad that operated passenger and freight service over an route between the Chicago Loop and downtown Milwaukee, a ...
carried motor carrier vehicles and shippers' vehicles loaded on flatcars between Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Chicago, Illinois. Beginning in 1929,
Seatrain Lines Seatrain Lines, officially the Over-Seas Shipping Company, was a shipping and transportation company conducting operations in the Americas and trans-Pacific regions. Seatrain Lines began intermodal freight transport in December 1928 by transporting ...
carried railroad boxcars on its sea vessels to transport goods between New York and Cuba. In the mid-1930s, the Chicago Great Western Railway and then the
New Haven Railroad The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad , commonly known as The Consolidated, or simply as the New Haven, was a railroad that operated in the New England region of the United States from 1872 to December 31, 1968. Founded by the merger of ...
began "
piggyback Piggyback, piggy-back, or piggybacking may mean: Transport * Piggyback (transportation), something that is riding on the back of something else Art, entertainment, and media * Splash cymbal piggybacking, mounting a cymbal on top of an already ...
" service (transporting highway freight trailers on flatcars) limited to their own railroads. The Chicago Great Western Railway filed a US patent in 1938 on their method of securing trailers to a flatcars using chains and turnbuckles. Other components included wheel chocks and ramps for loading and unloading the trailers from the flatcars. By 1953, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, the
Chicago and Eastern Illinois The Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad was a Class I railroad that linked Chicago to southern Illinois, St. Louis, and Evansville. Founded in 1877, it grew aggressively and stayed relatively strong throughout the Great Depression and two Wor ...
, and the
Southern Pacific The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the ...
railroads had joined the innovation. Most of the railcars used were surplus flatcars equipped with new decks. By 1955, an additional 25 railroads had begun some form of piggyback trailer service.


World War II

During WWII, the Australian Army used containers to more easily deal with various breaks of gauge in the railroads. These non-stackable containers were about the size of the later 20-foot ISO container and perhaps made mainly of wood. During the same time, the United States Army started to combine items of uniform size, lashing them onto a pallet, unitizing cargo to speed the loading and unloading of transport ships. In 1947 the Transportation Corps developed the ''Transporter'', a rigid, corrugated steel container with a carrying capacity, for shipping household goods of officers in the field. It was long, , and high, with double doors on one end, mounted on skids, and had lifting rings on the top four corners. During the Korean War the Transporter was evaluated for handling sensitive military equipment and, proving effective, was approved for broader use. Theft of material and damage to wooden crates convinced the army that steel containers were needed.


Mid-twentieth century

In April 1951, at
Zürich Tiefenbrunnen railway station Zürich Tiefenbrunnen railway station (german: Bahnhof Zürich Tiefenbrunnen) is a railway station in the Swiss city of Zürich. It is located on the Lake Zürich right bank railway line, and is situated on the shore of Lake Zürich, in the Seef ...
, the Swiss Museum of Transport and '' Bureau International des Containers'' (BIC) held demonstrations of container systems, with the aim of selecting the best solution for Western Europe. Present were representatives from France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Great Britain, Italy and the United States. The system chosen for Western Europe was based on the Netherlands' system for consumer goods and waste transportation called ''Laadkisten'' (literally, "loading bins"), in use since 1934. This system used roller containers that were moved by rail, truck and ship, in various configurations up to a capacity of , and up to size. This became the first post World War II European railway standard UIC 590, known as "pa-Behälter." It was implemented in the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, West Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and Denmark. With the popularization of the larger ISO containers, support for pa containers was phased out by the railways. In the 1970s they began to be widely used for transporting waste. In 1952 the US Army developed the Transporter into the CONtainer EXpress or CONEX box system. The size and capacity of the Conex were about the same as the Transporter, but the system was made ''modular'', by the addition of a smaller, half-size unit of long, wide and high.Development of Containerization // J. van Ham, J. Rijsenbrij
Steel containers
(page 8)
CONEXes could be stacked three high, and protected their contents from the elements. The first major shipment of CONEXes, containing engineering supplies and spare parts, was made by rail from the Columbus General Depot in Georgia to the Port of San Francisco, then by ship to Yokohama, Japan, and then to Korea, in late 1952. Transit times were almost halved. By the time of the Vietnam War the majority of supplies and materials were shipped by CONEX. By 1965 the US military used some 100,000 Conex boxes, and more than 200,000 in 1967. making this the first worldwide application of intermodal containers. After the US Department of Defense standardized an cross section container in multiples of lengths for military use, it was rapidly adopted for shipping purposes. In 1955, former trucking company owner Malcom McLean worked with engineer
Keith Tantlinger Keith Walton Tantlinger (March 22, 1919 – August 27, 2011) was a mechanical engineer and inventor. As Vice President of Engineering at the Fruehauf Trailer Corporation his inventions played a major role in containerization. Working with a Frueh ...
to develop the modern intermodal container. The challenge was to design a shipping container that could efficiently be loaded onto ships and would hold securely on sea voyages. The result was an tall by wide box in -long units constructed from thick corrugated steel. The design incorporated a twistlock mechanism atop each of the four corners, allowing the container to be easily secured and lifted using cranes. After helping McLean create the successful design, Tantlinger convinced him to give the patented designs to industry. This began international standardization of shipping containers.


Purpose-built ships

The first vessels purpose-built to carry containers had begun operation in 1926 for the regular connection of the luxury passenger train between London and Paris, the Golden Arrow/ Fleche d'Or. Four containers were used for the conveyance of passengers' baggage. These containers were loaded in London or Paris and carried to the ports of Dover or Calais. In February 1931 the first container ship in the world was launched. It was called the Autocarrier, owned by Southern Railway UK. It had 21 slots for containers of Southern Railway. The next step was in Europe was after WW II. Vessels purpose-built to carry containers were used between UK and Netherlands and also in Denmark in 1951. In the United States, ships began carrying containers in 1951, between Seattle, Washington and Alaska. None of these services was particularly successful. First, the containers were rather small, with 52% of them having a volume of less than . Almost all European containers were made of wood and used canvas lids, and they required additional equipment for loading into rail or truck bodies. The world's first purpose-built container vessel was ''Clifford J. Rodgers'', built in Montreal in 1955 and owned by the White Pass and Yukon Corporation. Her first trip carried 600 containers between North Vancouver, British Columbia, and Skagway, Alaska, on November 26, 1955. In Skagway, the containers were unloaded to purpose-built
railroad car A railroad car, railcar (American and Canadian English), railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck (British English and UIC), also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is a ...
s for transport north to Yukon, in the first intermodal service using trucks, ships, and railroad cars. Southbound containers were loaded by shippers in Yukon and moved by rail, ship, and truck to their consignees without opening. This first intermodal system operated from November 1955 until 1982. The first truly successful container shipping company dates to April 26, 1956, when American trucking entrepreneur McLean put 58 ''trailer vans'' later called containers, aboard a refitted tanker ship, the , and sailed them from Newark, New Jersey to
Houston, Texas Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...
. Independently of the events in Canada, McLean had the idea of using large containers that never opened in transit and that were transferable on an intermodal basis, among trucks, ships, and railroad cars. McLean had initially favored the construction of "trailerships"—taking trailers from large trucks and stowing them in a ship's cargo hold. This method of stowage, referred to as roll-on/roll-off, was not adopted because of the large waste in potential cargo space on board the vessel, known as broken stowage. Instead, McLean modified his original concept into loading just the containers, not the chassis, onto the ship; hence the designation "container ship" or "box" ship.Cudahy, Brian J.
"The Containership Revolution: Malcom McLean's 1956 Innovation Goes Global"
''TR News''. (c/o National Academy of Sciences). Number 246. September–October 2006
Levinson (2006), ''The Box''. (See also
pantechnicon van A pantechnicon van was originally a furniture removal van drawn by horses and used by the British company "The Pantechnicon" for delivering and collecting furniture which its customers wished to store. The name is a word largely of British Engl ...
and trolley and lift van.)


Toward standards

During the first 20 years of containerization, many container sizes and corner fittings were used. There were dozens of incompatible container systems in the US alone. Among the biggest operators, the Matson Navigation Company had a fleet of containers, while Sea-Land Service, Inc used containers. The standard sizes and fitting and reinforcement norms that now exist evolved out of a series of compromises among international shipping companies, European railroads, US railroads, and US trucking companies. Four important ISO ( International Organization for Standardization) recommendations standardized containerization globally:Rushton, A., Oxley, J., Croucher, P. (2004). ''The Handbook of Logistics and Distribution Management''. Kogan Page: London. * January 1968: ISO 668 defined the terminology, dimensions and ratings. * July 1968: R-790 defined the identification markings. * January 1970: R-1161 made recommendations about corner fittings. * October 1970: R-1897 set out the minimum internal dimensions of general purpose freight containers. Based on these standards, the first TEU container ship was the Japanese ' from shipowner NYK, which started sailing in 1968 and could carry 752 TEU containers. In the US, containerization and other advances in shipping were impeded by the
Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to eliminat ...
(ICC), which was created in 1887 to keep railroads from using monopolist pricing and rate discrimination, but fell victim to
regulatory capture In politics, regulatory capture (also agency capture and client politics) is a form of corruption of authority that occurs when a political entity, policymaker, or regulator is co-opted to serve the commercial, ideological, or political interests ...
. By the 1960s, ICC approval was required before any shipper could carry different items in the same vehicle or change rates. The fully integrated systems in the US today became possible only after the ICC's regulatory oversight was cut back (and abolished in 1995). Trucking and rail were deregulated in the 1970s and maritime rates were deregulated in 1984. Double-stacked rail transport, where containers are stacked two high on railway cars, was introduced in the US. The concept was developed by Sea-Land and the Southern Pacific railroad. The first standalone double-stack container car (or single-unit 40-ft COFC well car) was delivered in July 1977. The five-unit well car, the industry standard, appeared in 1981. Initially, these double-stack railway cars were deployed in regular train service. Ever since American President Lines initiated in 1984 a dedicated double-stack container train service between Los Angeles and Chicago, transport volumes increased rapidly.


Effects

Containerization greatly reduced the expense of international trade and increased its speed, especially of consumer goods and commodities. It also dramatically changed the character of port cities worldwide. Prior to highly mechanized container transfers, crews of 20 to 22
longshoremen A stevedore (), also called a longshoreman, a docker or a dockworker, is a waterfront manual laborer who is involved in loading and unloading ships, trucks, trains or airplanes. After the shipping container revolution of the 1960s, the number o ...
would pack individual cargoes into the hold of a ship. After containerization, large crews of longshoremen were not necessary at port facilities, and the profession changed drastically. Meanwhile, the port facilities needed to support containerization changed. One effect was the decline of some ports and the rise of others. At the Port of San Francisco, the former piers used for loading and unloading were no longer required, but there was little room to build the vast holding lots needed for storing and sorting containers in transit between different transport modes. As a result, the Port of San Francisco essentially ceased to function as a major commercial port, but the neighboring Port of Oakland emerged as the second largest on the US West Coast. A similar fate occurred with the relationship between the ports of Manhattan and New Jersey. In the UK, the Port of London and Port of Liverpool declined in importance. Meanwhile, Britain's Port of Felixstowe and Port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands emerged as major ports. In general, containerization caused inland ports on waterways incapable of receiving deep- draft ship traffic to decline in favor of seaports, which then built vast container terminals next to deep oceanfront harbors in lieu of the dockfront warehouses that had formerly handled break bulk cargo. With intermodal containers, the jobs of packing, unpacking, and sorting cargoes could be performed far from the point of embarkation. Such work shifted to gigantic warehouses in rural inland towns, where land and labor were much cheaper than in oceanfront cities. This fundamental transformation of where warehouse work was performed freed up valuable waterfront real estate near the
central business district A central business district (CBD) is the commercial and business centre of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides with the "city ...
s of port cities around the world for redevelopment and led to a plethora of waterfront revitalization projects (such as
warehouse districts A warehouse is a building for storing goods. Warehouses are used by manufacturers, importers, exporters, wholesalers, transport businesses, customs, etc. They are usually large plain buildings in industrial parks on the outskirts of cities, tow ...
). The effects of containerization rapidly spread beyond the shipping industry. Containers were quickly adopted by trucking and rail transport industries for cargo transport not involving sea transport. Manufacturing also evolved to adapt to take advantage of containers. Companies that once sent small consignments began grouping them into containers. Many cargoes are now designed to precisely fit containers. The reliability of containers made
just in time manufacturing Lean manufacturing is a production method aimed primarily at reducing times within the production system as well as response times from suppliers and to customers. It is closely related to another concept called just-in-time manufacturing (J ...
possible as component suppliers could deliver specific components on regular fixed schedules. In 2004, global container traffic was 354 million TEUs, of which 82 percent were handled by the world's top 100 container ports.


Twenty-first century

, approximately 90% of non- bulk cargo worldwide is moved by containers stacked on transport ships; 26% of all container transshipment is carried out in China. For example, in 2009 there were 105,976,701 transshipments in China (both international and coastal, excluding Hong Kong), 21,040,096 in Hong Kong (which is listed separately), and only 34,299,572 in the United States. In 2005, some 18 million containers made over 200 million trips per year. Some ships can carry over , such as the ''
Emma Mærsk ''Emma Mærsk'' is the first container ship in the of eight owned by the A. P. Moller-Maersk Group. When launched in 2006, she was the largest container ship ever built, and in 2010 she and her seven sister ships were among the longest ...
'', long, launched in August 2006. It has been predicted that, at some point, container ships will be constrained in size only by the depth of the
Straits of Malacca The Strait of Malacca is a narrow stretch of water, 500 mi (800 km) long and from 40 to 155 mi (65–250 km) wide, between the Malay Peninsula (Peninsular Malaysia) to the northeast and the Indonesian island of Sumatra to the southwest, connec ...
, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, linking the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. This so-called Malaccamax size constrains a ship to dimensions of in length and wide. Few foresaw the extent of the influence of containerization on the shipping industry. In the 1950s, Harvard University economist
Benjamin Chinitz Benjamin ( he, ''Bīnyāmīn''; "Son of (the) right") blue letter bible: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h3225/kjv/wlc/0-1/ H3225 - yāmîn - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon (kjv) was the last of the two sons of Jacob and Rachel (Jacob's thir ...
predicted that containerization would benefit New York by allowing it to ship its industrial goods more cheaply to the Southern US than other areas, but he did not anticipate that containerization might make it cheaper to import such goods from abroad. Most economic studies of containerization merely assumed that shipping companies would begin to replace older forms of transportation with containerization, but did not predict that the process of containerization itself would have a more direct influence on the choice of producers and increase the total volume of trade. The widespread use of ISO standard containers has driven modifications in other freight-moving standards, gradually forcing removable truck bodies or
swap bodies A swap body, swop body, exchangeable container or interchangeable unit, is one of the types of standard freight intermodal container, containers for road and rail transport. Based on and very similar to the more widespread Intermodal container, ...
into standard sizes and shapes (though without the strength needed to be stacked), and changing completely the worldwide use of freight
pallet A pallet (also called a skid) is a flat transport structure, which supports goods in a stable fashion while being lifted by a forklift, a pallet jack, a front loader, a jacking device, or an erect crane. A pallet is the structural foundat ...
s that fit into ISO containers or into commercial vehicles. Improved cargo security is an important benefit of containerization. Once the cargo is loaded into a container, it isn't touched again until it reaches its destination. The cargo is not visible to casual viewers, and thus is less likely to be stolen. Container doors are usually sealed so that tampering is more evident. Some containers are fitted with electronic monitoring devices and can be remotely monitored for changes in air pressure, which happens when the doors are opened. This reduced thefts that had long plagued the shipping industry. Recent developments have focused on the use of intelligent logistics optimization to further enhance security. The use of the same basic sizes of containers across the globe has lessened the problems caused by incompatible
rail gauge In rail transport, track gauge (in American English, alternatively track gage) is the distance between the two rails of a railway track. All vehicles on a rail network must have wheelsets that are compatible with the track gauge. Since many d ...
sizes. The majority of the rail networks in the world operate on a gauge track known as
standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in Ea ...
, but some countries (such as Russia, India, Finland, and Lithuania) use broader gauges, while others in Africa and South America use narrower gauges. The use of container trains in all these countries makes transshipment between trains of different gauges easier. Containers have become a popular way to ship private cars and other vehicles overseas using 20- or 40-foot containers. Unlike roll-on/roll-off vehicle shipping, personal effects can be loaded into the container with the vehicle, allowing easy international relocation. In July, 2020, The Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA), a non-profit group established to further digitalisation of container shipping technology standards, published standards for the digital exchange of operational vessel schedules (OVS). Contrary to ocean shipping containers owned by the shippers, a persisting trend in the industry is for (new) units to be purchased by leasing companies. Leasing business accounted for 55% of new container purchases in 2017, with their box fleet growing at 6.7%, compared to units of transport operators growing by just 2.4% more TEU, said global shipping consultancy Drewry in their 'Container Census & Leasing and Equipment Insight', leading to a leased share of the global ocean container fleet reaching 54% by 2020. In 2021, the average time to unload a container in Asia was 27 seconds, the average time in Northern Europe was 46 seconds, and the average time in North America was 76 seconds.


Container standards


ISO standard

There are five common standard lengths: * * * * * US domestic standard containers are generally and (rail and truck). Container capacity is often expressed in
twenty-foot equivalent unit The twenty-foot equivalent unit (abbreviated TEU or teu) is an inexact unit of cargo capacity, often used for container ships and container ports.Rowlett, 2004. It is based on the volume of a intermodal container, a standard-sized metal box whic ...
s (TEU, or sometimes ''teu''). An equivalent unit is a measure of containerized cargo capacity equal to one standard (length) × (width) container. As this is an approximate measure, the height of the box is not considered. For instance, the ''high cube'' and the ''half height'' containers are also called one TEU. 48' containers have been phased out over the last ten years in favor of 53' containers. The maximum gross mass for a dry cargo container was initially set at , and for a container (including the high cube) . Allowing for the tare mass of the container, the maximum payload mass is therefore reduced to approximately for , and for containers. It was increased to 30,480 kg for the 20' in 2005, then further increased to a max of 36,000 kg for all sizes by the amendment 2 (2016) of the ISO standard 668 (2013). The original choice of height for ISO containers was made in part to suit a large proportion of railway tunnels, though some had to be modified. The current standard is high. With the arrival of even taller hi-cube containers at and double stacking rail cars, further enlargement of the rail
loading gauge A loading gauge is a diagram or physical structure that defines the maximum height and width dimensions in railway vehicles and their loads. Their purpose is to ensure that rail vehicles can pass safely through tunnels and under bridges, and ke ...
is proving necessary.


Air freight containers

While major airlines use containers that are custom designed for their aircraft and associated ground handling equipment the
IATA The International Air Transport Association (IATA ) is a trade association of the world's airlines founded in 1945. IATA has been described as a cartel since, in addition to setting technical standards for airlines, IATA also organized tariff ...
has created a set of standard aluminium container sizes of up to in volume.


Other container system standards

Some other container systems (in date order) are: * (1922)
NYC container The New York Central Rail Road introduced a container system in 1922. Specifications Details include: * Width: * Length: * Height: * Tare weight See also * Containerization * Intermodal container * Shipping container A shipping contai ...
* (1924) von-Haus-zu-Haus (''house to house''; Germany) * Japanese railway containers: Containers used by the Japan Freight Railway Company * (1925) Mack * (1927)
English Railway container English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...
* (1928) Victorian Railways – refrigerated container * (1929) International Competition * (1930)
GWR Container The Great Western Railway was a British railway company that linked London with the Midlands, the south-west and west of England and most of Wales. In 1930 it introduced 100 containers primarily for building materials. Specifications Details ...
* (1931) International Chamber of Commerce * (1933)
International Container Bureau The Bureau International des Containers et du Transport Intermodal (originally french: Bureau International des Conteneurs, still abbreviated BIC, en, International Container Bureau) oversees standards for intermodal containers, commonly referred ...
: * (1936) South Australian Railways Wolseley break of gauge * (1946) Queensland Railways milk container, , road-rail * (1974) RACE (Australia) – slightly wider than ISO containers to fit slightly wider Australian Standard
pallet A pallet (also called a skid) is a flat transport structure, which supports goods in a stable fashion while being lifted by a forklift, a pallet jack, a front loader, a jacking device, or an erect crane. A pallet is the structural foundat ...
s * (1994)
ACTS The Acts of the Apostles ( grc-koi, Πράξεις Ἀποστόλων, ''Práxeis Apostólōn''; la, Actūs Apostolōrum) is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of its message ...
roller containers for intermodal transport by rail and road (Central Europe) * (1998) PODS * (2005?)
SECU Secu is a commune in Dolj County, Oltenia, Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the wes ...
(Sweden, Finland, UK) – big container. * Pallet-wide containers are used in Europe and have length () and height like ISO-containers, but they are wide externally and internally to fit EUR-pallet better. They are meant for transport inside Europe and are often accepted in ships. * (2014) The IPPC's
Sea Container Task Force The International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) is a 1951 multilateral treaty overseen by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization that aims to secure coordinated, effective action to prevent and to control the introduction and ...
(SCTF) finalises the
Cargo Transport Units Code The International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) is a 1951 multilateral treaty overseen by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization that aims to secure coordinated, effective action to prevent and to control the introduction and ...
(CTU Code). * (2021) The National Standard of the People's Republic of China is GB/T 39919-2021 .


Container loading


Full container load

A full container load (FCL) is an ISO standard container that is loaded and unloaded under the risk and account of one shipper and one consignee. In practice, it means that the whole container is intended for one consignee. FCL container shipment tends to have lower freight rates than an equivalent weight of cargo in bulk. FCL is intended to designate a container loaded to its allowable maximum weight or volume, but FCL in practice on
ocean freight Maritime transport (or ocean transport) and hydraulic effluvial transport, or more generally waterborne transport, is the transport of people (passengers) or goods (cargo) via waterways. Freight transport by sea has been widely used throug ...
does not always mean a full payload or capacity - many companies will prefer to keep a 'mostly' full container as a single container load to simplify logistics and increase security compared to sharing a container with other goods.


Less-than-container load

Less-than-container load (LCL) is a shipment that is not large enough to fill a standard
cargo container An intermodal container, often called a shipping container, is a large standardized shipping container, designed and built for intermodal freight transport, meaning these containers can be used across different modes of transport – from ship ...
. The abbreviation LCL formerly applied to "less than (railway) car load" for quantities of material from different shippers or for delivery to different destinations carried in a single railway car for efficiency. LCL freight was often sorted and redistributed into different railway cars at intermediate
railway terminal A train station, railway station, railroad station or depot is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track and a station building providing such ...
s en route to the final destination. Groupage is the process of filling a container with multiple shipments for efficiency. LCL is "a quantity of cargo less than that required for the application of a carload rate. A quantity of cargo less than that which fills the visible or rated capacity of an inter-modal container." It can also be defined as "a consignment of cargo which is inefficient to fill a shipping container. It is grouped with other consignments for the same destination in a container at a container freight station".


Issues


Hazards

Containers have been used to smuggle
contraband Contraband (from Medieval French ''contrebande'' "smuggling") refers to any item that, relating to its nature, is illegal to be possessed or sold. It is used for goods that by their nature are considered too dangerous or offensive in the eyes o ...
or stolen cars. The vast majority of containers are never subjected to scrutiny due to their large numbers. In recent years there have been increased concerns that containers might be used to transport terrorists or terrorist materials into a country undetected. The US government has advanced the Container Security Initiative (CSI), intended to ensure that high-risk cargo is examined or scanned, preferably at the port of departure.


Empty containers

Containers are intended to be used constantly, being loaded with new cargo for a new destination soon after emptied of previous cargo. This is not always possible, and in some cases, the cost of transporting an empty container to a place where it can be used is considered to be higher than the worth of the used container. Shipping lines and container leasing companies have become expert at repositioning empty containers from areas of low or no demand, such as the US West Coast, to areas of high demand, such as China. Repositioning within the port hinterland has also been the focus of recent logistics optimization work. Damaged or retired containers may be recycled in the form of shipping container architecture, or the steel content salvaged. In the summer of 2010, a worldwide shortage of containers developed as shipping increased after the recession, while new container production had largely ceased.


Loss at sea

Containers occasionally fall from ships, usually during storms. According to media sources, between 2,000Containers Overboard!

TT Club
'' (Maritime insurers). Accessed: 26 February 2011.
and 10,000 containers are lost at sea each year. The
World Shipping Council The World Shipping Council (WSC) is the primary industry trade association representing the international liner shipping industry, which offers regularly scheduled service on fixed schedules. Most liner carriers are container shipping lines. The W ...
states in a survey among freight companies that this claim is grossly excessive and calculated an average of 350 containers to be lost at sea each year, or 675 if including catastrophic events.


' (World Shipping Council). Accessed: 11 July 2013.
For instance, on November 30, 2006, a container washed ashore on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, along with thousands of bags of its cargo of Doritos Chips. Containers lost in rough waters are smashed by cargo and waves, and often sink quickly. Although not all containers sink, they seldom float very high out of the water, making them a shipping hazard that is difficult to detect. Freight from lost containers has provided oceanographers with unexpected opportunities to track global ocean currents, notably a cargo of
Friendly Floatees Friendly Floatees are plastic bath toys (including rubber ducks) marketed by The First Years and made famous by the work of Curtis Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer who models ocean currents on the basis of flotsam movements. Ebbesmeyer studied the ...
. In 2007 the International Chamber of Shipping and the
World Shipping Council The World Shipping Council (WSC) is the primary industry trade association representing the international liner shipping industry, which offers regularly scheduled service on fixed schedules. Most liner carriers are container shipping lines. The W ...
began work on a code of practice for container storage, including crew training on
parametric rolling Parametric may refer to: Mathematics * Parametric equation, a representation of a curve through equations, as functions of a variable *Parametric statistics, a branch of statistics that assumes data has come from a type of probability distribu ...
, safer stacking, the marking of containers, and security for above-deck cargo in heavy swell.Murdoch & Tozer
A Master's guide to Container Securing
'' Lloyd's Register & Standard P&I Club''. Accessed: 26 February 2011.
In 2011, the MV Rena ran aground off the coast of New Zealand. As the ship listed, some containers were lost, while others were held on board at a precarious angle.


Trade union challenges

Some of the biggest battles in the container revolution were waged in Washington, D.C.. Intermodal shipping got a huge boost in the early 1970s, when carriers won permission to quote combined rail-ocean rates. Later, non-vessel-operating common carriers won a long court battle with a US Supreme Court decision against contracts that attempted to require that union labor be used for stuffing and stripping containers at off-pier locations.


As pest vector

Containers are often
infested ''Ticks'', also known as ''Infested'', is a 1993 direct-to-video horror film directed by Tony Randel and starring Peter Scolari, Seth Green, Rosalind Allen, Ami Dolenz, Alfonso Ribeiro, and Clint Howard. Plot Drug dealer Jarvis Tanner uses ster ...
with
pest Pest or The Pest may refer to: Science and medicine * Pest (organism), an animal or plant deemed to be detrimental to humans or human concerns ** Weed, a plant considered undesirable * Infectious disease, an illness resulting from an infection ** ...
s. Pest introductions are significantly clustered around ports, and containers are a common source of such successful pest transfers. The IPPC
Sea Container Task Force The International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) is a 1951 multilateral treaty overseen by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization that aims to secure coordinated, effective action to prevent and to control the introduction and ...
(SCTF) promulgates the
Cargo Transport Units Code The International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) is a 1951 multilateral treaty overseen by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization that aims to secure coordinated, effective action to prevent and to control the introduction and ...
(CTU), prescribed
pesticide Pesticides are substances that are meant to control pests. This includes herbicide, insecticide, nematicide, molluscicide, piscicide, avicide, rodenticide, bactericide, insect repellent, animal repellent, microbicide, fungicide, and lampri ...
s and other standards (see ) and recommendations for use in container decontamination, inspection and quarantine. The SCTF also provides the English translation of the National Standard of China ( GB/T 39919-2021).


Other uses for containers

Shipping container architecture is the use of containers as the basis for housing and other functional buildings for people, either as temporary or a permanent housing, and either as a main building or as a cabin or as a workshop. Containers can also be used as sheds or storage areas in industry and commerce. Tempo Housing in Amsterdam stacks containers for individual housing units. Containers are also beginning to be used to house computer data centers, although these are normally specialized containers. There is now a high demand for containers to be converted in the domestic market to serve specific purposes. As a result, a number of container-specific accessories have become available for a variety of applications, such as racking for archiving, lining, heating, lighting, powerpoints to create purpose-built secure offices, canteens and drying rooms, condensation control for furniture storage, and ramps for storage of heavier objects. Containers are also converted to provide equipment enclosures, pop-up cafes, exhibition stands, security huts and more. Public containerised transport is the concept, not yet implemented, of modifying motor vehicles to serve as personal containers in non-road passenger transport. The ACTS roller container standards have become the basis of containerized firefighting equipment throughout Europe. Containers have also been used for weapon systems, such as the Russian Club-K, which allow the conversion of an ordinary container system into a missile boat, capable of attacking surface and ground targets, and the CWS (Containerized Weapon System) developed for the US Army that allow for the rapid deployment of a remote controlled machine gun post from a container.


BBC tracking project

On September 5, 2008, the BBC embarked on a year-long project to study international trade and globalization by tracking a shipping container on its journey around the world.


See also

*
2000s energy crisis From the mid-1980s to September 2003, the inflation-adjusted price of a barrel of crude oil on NYMEX was generally under US$25/barrel in 2008 dollars. During 2003, the price rose above $30, reached $60 by 11 August 2005, and peaked at $147. ...
*
Conflat Conflat is a United Kingdom railway term for a short wheelbase flat wagon container wagon. British Railways used several standard types of wagon. The Conflat A, which could carry one type 'B', or two type 'A', containers, was the most common ...
*
Container terminal design process Container port design process is a set of correlated practices considered during container port design, aiming to transfer general business mission into detailed design documents for future construction and operation. The design process involves ...
* Double-stack rail transport * Henry Robinson Palmer described an early principle of containerization. *
Inter-box connector A twistlock or twist lock, together with matching corner castings, as defined in norms including ISO 1161:1984, form a standardized (rotating) connector system, for connecting and securing intermodal, and predominantly ISO-standard internatio ...
* Intermodal container * List of cargo types * List of world's busiest container ports * Little Eaton Gangway 1798 * Multimodal transport *
NYC container The New York Central Rail Road introduced a container system in 1922. Specifications Details include: * Width: * Length: * Height: * Tare weight See also * Containerization * Intermodal container * Shipping container A shipping contai ...
1922 *
Shipping portal Shipping portals are websites which allow shippers, consignees and forwarders access to multiple carriers through a single site. Portals provide bookings, track and trace, and documentation, and allow users to communicate with their carriers. In ma ...
* Stowage plan for container ships * Tanktainers * Unit load


Notes


References


Further reading

* – Novel set in U.S., wherein mystery surrounding a containerized shipment serves as the MacGuffin * – How Container Ships Changed the World * – Containerization from the 1950s to the Present * * * * * * *
ASTM ASTM International, formerly known as American Society for Testing and Materials, is an international standards organization that develops and publishes voluntary consensus technical standards for a wide range of materials, products, systems, an ...
D 5728 Standard Practice for Securement of Cargo in Intermodal and Unimodal Surface Transport * – types, inspection, climate, stowage, securing, capacity * * – a guidebook for first responders during the initial phase of a dangerous goods/hazardous materials incident * * – A good pictorial introduction to containers {{Container shipping companies Intermodal containers Economic globalization