Less-than-truckload provider Roadrunner (OTC: RRTS) announced the addition of five direct service lanes to its metro-to-metro network on Thursday. The company said it also improved transit times on many of the lanes it serves.
The new lanes include: Phoenix to Chicago; Detroit to Dallas; Indianapolis to Atlanta; St. Louis to Dallas; and Cincinnati to Atlanta. Further, service times in 66 lanes were reduced by at least one day.
“This improvement arrives just in time for summer to benefit our many customers,” Roadrunner president Frank Hurst said. “We’ve spent the last two years overhauling our network to make sure we only operate in lanes where we can provide service and quality. As a result, we’ve seen our on-time service percentage increase dramatically across the network.”
The Downers Grove, Illinois-based company has emerged from a restructuring in which it sold noncore business units and used a $50 million private placement to advance technology initiatives. The changes were designed to minimize capital requirements and allow it to simplify operations and focus primarily on LTL freight.
Roadrunner now leverages a network of more than 900 independent contractors, 32 dedicated service centers and over 100 pickup and delivery partners to move freight between major markets in the U.S. The announced network enhancements are the second iteration of a service overhaul. In February, Roadrunner improved service times in 120 long-haul lanes across the markets it serves.
“This is the second time this year we’ve sped up our network and reduced transit times and we’re not stopping here,” Hurst said.
Said Philip Thalheim, Roadrunner’s director of linehaul analytics: “Moving transit times up in these 66 lanes is just the beginning. Our analytics team proved that we run faster than our stated transit times in more than 650 lanes, almost 20% of our 3,700 lanes.”
Investments in dimensionalizers and dock automation, as well as network and load plan enhancements, have added capacity and driven the reduction in delivery times. The changes have also allowed the company to largely eliminate the use of rail capacity, which typically bogs down service in most regions.
“The team at Roadrunner has improved its training, its people and its service,” executive chairman of the board Chris Jamroz said. “We’ve made significant investments in our technology to provide 100% end-to-end network visibility, improve site-level performance and optimize data, allowing us to provide better service at a better value.”
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