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Ongoing concern about labor and management talks regarding two separate contract negotiations and a slowing U.S. economy resulted in a big drop in container volume at two of the nation’s biggest ports on the Pacific Coast.

As this year’s holiday shopping season ramps up, shipping industry experts say supply chain issues that plagued the season last year have alleviated, but there are other dynamics at play.

DALLAS — Higher operating costs, more volatile market cycles and a shift from West Coast ports are characteristics of the post-pandemic freight market, according to an industry analyst.

Norfolk Southern Corp. agreed to acquire Cincinnati Southern Railway, tightening the company’s grip on a critical 337-mile line it already operates under a lease agreement.

The national average price for diesel slid 8 cents to $5.233 a gallon, according to Energy Information Administration data released Nov. 21.

The nation’s major shipping companies are in the best shape to get holiday shoppers’ packages delivered on time since the start of the pandemic, suggesting a return to normalcy.

The possibility of a nationwide freight rail strike beginning as early as Dec. 9 moved one step closer when the union SMART-TD, one of the largest in contract talks with the six Class I freight carriers, turned down a tentative agreement negotiated in mid-September by Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and other officials.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has issued interim guidance on the definitions of brokers, bona fide agents and the role of dispatch services in the supply chain.

Clarus Solutions' Blake Baumann: "One solution to help ease some pressure in the trucking industry may lie in pursuing government tax incentive programs, such as the Work Opportunity Tax Credit."

A federal judge has ordered Amazon to stop retaliating against employees engaged in workplace activism, issuing a mixed ruling that also hands a loss to the federal labor agency that sued the company earlier this year.