Keep on trucking and rolling.

• Author: Pratt, Fred
• Position: Alaska's trucking and railroad industries

It's not a tale of doom and gloom for Alaska's road and rail carriers. A steady stream of big projects and a steady flow of customers brought good earnings to truck companies and the Alaska Railroad Corp. in 1994 and promise to do the same in 1995.

There was nothing dramatic about 1994 for the trucking and railroad operators in Alaska, just a good steady flow of business and a promise of more to come.

"Last year was very good, and I think it's going to be pretty steady this year," says Edith Montpetit, president of Sig Wold Storage & Transfer of Anchorage. "The only time it really picks up is when there are big construction jobs, and I haven't heard of any."

Harry McDonald, president and chairman of Anchorage-based Carlile Enterprises Inc., says that 1994 was a bit out of the ordinary for his company, which purchased the K&W truckline, formerly based in St. Cloud, Minn.

"Our volume will be double, and we're anticipating a further increase in '95," says McDonald. "The company (K&W) was run by telephone and computer from St. Cloud and was far from living up to its potential. The two systems fit well together."

According to McDonald, the two lines merged with no loss of Alaskan jobs. He says some Minnesota managers were let go and replaced with new people here in the state, and the operating staff remained the same.

"Economically, we wound up with a pretty good year for everybody in 1994," reports Frank Dillon of the Alaska Trucking Association (ATA). "The economy was strong. There was good activity from the state capital budget, and there was more oil industry business than most of us anticipated."

ATA's biggest effort in 1995 will be to change the state's highway size and weight restrictions to make trucking more efficient. "We're trying to do something to minimize the amount of time highways are under weight restriction," Dillon explains.

Alaska roads are often closed or have reduced weight limits for weeks at a time during spring breakup. The association is working with the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT/PF), with assistance from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, to see what modern roadbeds and road maintenance can handle.

While reducing weight might be only a minor inconvenience for a truck loaded in Anchorage, reducing weight is particularly troublesome for cargoes prepared and sealed in other states. Loads have to be reduced at the point of origin, weeks ahead of the anticipated spring breakup.

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