Street Turn

A street turn is the reuse of an emptied import container for an export shipment without first taking it back to the port, rail ramp or container depot. Once the importer has unloaded the box, a trucker drives it directly to a nearby exporter, who fills it with outbound cargo. The container then returns to the terminal loaded instead of empty. Trucking companies, importers, exporters and the ocean carriers or lessors that own the equipment all take part.

The practice is one of the simplest ways to reduce empty container repositioning on land. It is different from a street interchange, in which the box passes from one trucking company to another, and from a depot swap, in which the empty is still returned and a different box is collected. In North America the arrangements are handled under the Uniform Intermodal Interchange and Facilities Access Agreement (UIIA), administered by the Intermodal Association of North America.

Imagine a taxi that drops a passenger at the airport and then drives back to the city empty, while another taxi drives out empty to collect someone landing at the same airport. If the first taxi simply picked up the arriving passenger, two empty journeys would disappear, and the roads would be a little quieter.

A street turn does this with shipping containers. Instead of hauling an empty box back to the port and sending another truck to fetch a different empty box for an exporter down the road, the same box goes straight from the importer to the exporter. The shipping line still gets its container back at the port, only now it is full of goods.

A street turn needs the right box, the right timing and permission from the box's owner. A typical sequence runs as follows:

1. An import container is delivered to a consignee and unloaded within the carrier's free time.
2. The trucker or its customer finds an export booking nearby that uses the same carrier, or a carrier that accepts the box, and needs the same size and type of container.
3. The trucker asks the equipment owner to approve the reuse, typically through an online request system, and the carrier links the box to the export booking.
4. The box is inspected, delivered to the exporter, loaded and returned to the terminal under the export bill of lading.

Approval matters because the trucking firm that took the box out of the terminal stays responsible for it under its interchange agreement until it is returned. The Street Interchange application run by the Intermodal Association of North America records the request, checks that each party has a valid interchange agreement and transfers liability where a second trucker is involved.

The benefit of a street turn is the cost of the empty legs it removes, less any extra distance and fees:

• $S$ is the saving from one street turn.
• $c$ is the trucking cost per mile.
• $d_{r}$ is the distance from the importer back to the port or depot to return the empty.
• $d_{p}$ is the distance from the depot to the exporter to deliver a fresh empty.
• $d_{t}$ is the direct distance from the importer to the exporter.
• $g$ is the terminal gate and handling fees avoided, and $f$ is any street-turn fee the carrier charges.

Suppose an importer and an exporter are both 40 miles from the port and 10 miles from each other, trucking costs $4 a mile, avoided gate fees are $60 and the carrier charges a $50 street-turn fee. The saving is $4 \times (40 + 40 - 10) + 60 - 50 = 290$, or $290 per box, before counting the time drivers no longer spend queuing at the terminal.

Street turns help several parties at once:

• Shippers and truckers. Fewer empty trips cut fuel, driver hours and the risk of demurrage or detention bills when terminals are hard to reach.
• Ports. Fewer empty returns reduce gate queues and yard dwell time, freeing space for loaded boxes.
• Equipment owners. Carriers and container leasing firms get boxes loaded on the backhaul without paying to move them.
• Cities. Fewer truck miles mean less congestion and lower emissions around port areas.

Street turns remain a small share of the container moves generated by international trade because the conditions rarely line up. The import and export must use the same box type and size, measured in TEU, and the export cargo must be ready while the box is still within free time. Many inland regions import much more than they export, the same imbalance behind a national trade deficit, so there is often no nearby export load. Carriers may refuse a request if they want the box back for a different lane, if it needs repair, or if the exporter books with a rival line. Some carriers charge fees for approval, which shrink the saving shown in the formula above and change the unit economics for small trucking firms.

Food-grade and pharmaceutical exporters may also reject boxes that previously carried chemicals or odorous goods. Freight forwarders and matching platforms try to overcome these limits by sharing booking data, so that an emptied box can be paired with a suitable export before it leaves the importer's yard. Where the sales contract uses Incoterms that leave inland haulage to the buyer or seller, that party usually decides whether a street turn is worth arranging.

• Intermodal Association of North America: Street Interchange Application
• Federal Maritime Commission