So I Got A Couple Questions About Freight Lanes

Do freight lanes vary from company to company? Do the mega corps even have freight lanes? (Like prime) is there a difference between freight lanes and areas that are known to have a lot of freight? How would one obtain this knowledge?

I only ask because when i upgrade i wanna be able to say ok im heading to point B and freight sucks from there so i better stock up extra on food. Or if freight is really good i can make do with current supplies and resupply later. Also if im heading to an area with horrid loads coming out then maybe i can catch that movie ive been wanting to see.

If you mean upgrading to owner operator , then that's something you figure out over time. But if you have to take a crappy load to get out of a bad area to get to a good area, it'll end up averaging out.

As a company driver, you have little choice depending on which company you work for.

If you mean upgrading to owner operator , then that's something you figure out over time. But if you have to take a crappy load to get out of a bad area to get to a good area, it'll end up averaging out.

As a company driver, you have little choice depending on which company you work for.

He's not referring to becoming an O/O - as if that was an upgrade anyhow. He's a Prime employee, talking about upgrading his status to solo.

I have yet to hear "freight is slow so I dont have a load for.you". I actually have to tell.my FM to leave me alone lol

thanksgiving I ran my load and repowered someone else. Christmas I had a 2200 mile load, Memorial day july fourth and labor day I had loads. do I get shorter loads for a bit..yes.

dont worry avout freight. learn to.manage your clocks anf you will get plenty

Aweaome thanks guys. Im glad i dont have to worry about getting sent somewhere and getting stuck there. Happened once when a shipper had a massive issue at their packing plant and we sat for 30 hours.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but my basic definition of a freight lane is a highway or series of highways a company tends to run alot. It's usually the link between two or more areas that have a lot of freight. Even the big companies have freight lanes. I don't know what they are at Prime, but I know I started to catch on to some of them when I was running reefer here at Swift. My first couple months I had a hard time running well the week before hometime. It wasn't til a few months in that I started to pick up on the areas we tended to run alot. Once I figured that out, I'd use that information to help me stay running before hometime and still get home on time.

Ideally, the planners are the ones who are supposed to do all that for you, but sometimes you gotta be a little proactive.

My scenario was that I lived near Denver and we have alot of reefer freight running back and forth between Salt Lake, and also a bunch of meat loads heading back and forth between Denver and Grand Island, NE. There are more but that was enough to help me out. I remember one time I got home several days early so I just asked for a load to Salt Lake and then they sent me right back to Denver once I got up there. So I got an extra 1000 miles on that paycheck and still got home on time. In fact, I was still a day early for home time so once I got back to Denver I offered to run a couple local loads for the planner. It was easy and made it a profitable week for me.

Piano man your are certainly correct. I typically run either the I 40 or I 80 corridor east to west and back. Rainy has a good dispatcher who is able to keep her moving which is great. Rainy you'll have a time where it's hard to find a load and sit a little it's just nature of the beast.

Certainly depending on the time of year we do have lanes that can be sluggish. Example produce season is now upon us in California and if you happen to be in the salinas area good luck trying to get a shower at the pilot. It's busier then a one arm paper hanger. Go there during December and it's a ghost town!

Everyone knows Florida is easy to get a load to but can be a little harder to find one out of. Prime has a few good accounts there so it tends to be a bit easier for us but depending on how many drivers they have down there you can sit a bit.

I remember in January my fleet mgr sent a message that they were short around 400 loads in the NE so if you get dispatched just take it.