b'8American Journal ofTransportation ajot.com(NEUTRALcontinuedping schedule offerings or the from page 4) companysarrayofoffices.an NVO that isnt part ofAsTroyexplains,ifyou anotherentitysuchasafor- lookatoursystemsforthe warder,oceancarrier,trans- NVO industry, what our client portationintermediaryorseesisthisnice,front-end even a shipperis perhapsbrandedstream,butunder-more important in this era ofneath that is all those moving disruptions.Taketherecentparts, and how we connect to ILA strike as an example,those, whether its the vessel thephoneshavebeennon- carriers, the CFSs, everything stop for the last 10 days whenunderneath that. Theres a lot everybody realized that werethat flows underneath that, to going to be running up againstmake that webpage, and track-what were running up againsting and make all that happen inthis[ILA]strike,andtheunderneath.NVOs, and more so probablyAndmakingtheentire the neutral NVOs, really giveprocessvisibleandexecut-that flexibility from that LCLable to all the parties involved to FCL option and vice versa,intheshipmentiswhere Troy noted. tech is keyas Troy says, But disruptions have beenTaking those 30 entities, 40 a regular feature of the busi- entities that are involved in a ness in recent years and neu- shipment,absorbingallthat tral NVOs like Troy Containerdata and all that communica- (BUILDINGcontinued from page 6) 9. The ramp from Port Street to Corbin Street provide a flexible alternative,tion, and making it availablewider turning angle and the restoration of acurrently serves approximately 3,600 vehicles as Troy pointed out, It usedinastreamlinedmannertosecond lane. This will allow for a safer, moreduring a typical peak hour, 40% of which is tobeeithercargowasLCLthe client is what were doingefficienttrafficflowintothecomplexfromtruck traffic.and it kind of stayed that way,(NEUTRALcontinued onmajorroadwaysincludingtheNewJerseyAsPANYNJExecutiveDirectorRick or FCL. Now you need to bepage 10) Turnpike, Interstate 78, and U.S. routes 1 and(BUILDINGcontinued on page 14)abletoflexbetweenthose twooptionsprettyquickly and know those break-evens pretty quickly Now with the disruptions poppingupwithmaddening regularity,shippersneedto haveroutingoptionsmore than just your standard routing option is the amount of disrup-tion that weve faced through COVID times, through differ-ent strikes, through geopoliti-cal concerns. Theres a lot of flexibility that needs to be in the supply chains.As Troy said of this new worldoffreight,When cargomovessmoothly,its easy to rely on your steady options,butwhentheres anytypeofdisruption,you needthose[alternative] options, and thats where we [neutral NVOs] fill in, espe-ciallyduringthose[disrup-tive] times.t ech aND theNVOWhile you never think of an NVO being a Tech com-pany, there is an argument to be made that they are as the role of being a communica-tor is now as valuable as that of securing the transportation component of the transporta-tion transaction.As Troy said of the pro-cess, I mean were [NVOs] aconduitofthatcommuni-cation.Youhaveallthose partiesfromoriginthrough destination, every regulatory body,everydrayagepro-vider,vesseloperators,CFS locations. Were that middle person sitting between all of thatandmakingthatcom-munication happen to the end clientand how we do that is important.ForaneutralNVOthe abilitytofacilitatethecom-munication is more than just afeatureofthebusiness,it isinmanywaysadifferen-tiator.Itismuchthereason aforwarderorBCOwould choose an NVO as is the ship-'