84% of Shippers Would Shift to Rail With Better Freight Visibility

For supply chain leaders, rail remains the black hole of multimodal visibility. While 73% of decision-makers rate real-time visibility as a high priority, only 26% say they have real-time location tracking on rail moves. That gap is not just an operational annoyance—it is actively costing rail modal share and forcing shippers into less efficient workarounds.

On September 17, 2026, Business Wire distributed a research summary commissioned by Giesecke+Devrient (G+D), a global SecurityTech company, that should force U.S. freight railroads and their logistics partners to rethink where they compete. The headline finding from a survey of 500 U.S. logistics, transportation, and supply chain decision-makers is that only 23% can currently track and monitor the condition of goods moving by rail on a continuous basis, while 84% said they would be more likely to increase their use of rail in future operations if they had greater visibility. That is a 61-percentage-point gap between current capability and stated demand—a gap that translates directly into lost rail volume and, by extension, higher costs and emissions elsewhere in the supply chain.

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The G+D data quantifies that gap: only 26% of respondents report access to real-time location tracking on the rail leg, 14% only receive occasional updates, and another 14% see only departure and arrival times.

The finding matters because U.S. rail has long been able to claim structural advantages over trucking: lower cost per ton-mile, better fuel efficiency, and less highway congestion. Yet rail's share of domestic freight has stubbornly lagged in many corridors. Trucking and parcel networks have built real-time telematics, electronic logging, and visibility platforms into everyday operations, giving shippers granular, event-level data. Rail, by contrast, has often remained an operational black box between yard arrival and final delivery. The G+D data quantifies that gap: only 26% of respondents report access to real-time location tracking on the rail leg, 14% only receive occasional updates, and another 14% see only departure and arrival times. For a shipper trying to plan a warehouse crew or schedule a drayage pickup, that level of information is insufficient.

The survey also shows that shippers are not simply asking for a dot on a map. The leading motivation for greater visibility, cited by 45% of respondents, is the ability to plan and optimize downstream operations. This is an operational, not cosmetic, need. Rail visibility unlocks better sequencing of unloading, cross-docking, and final-mile handoffs. The second tier of motivations is equally practical: 33% want verifiable evidence to contest accessorial and demurrage charges, 33% need condition monitoring for perishable, pharmaceutical, or hazardous goods, and 32% want earlier alerts to theft or unexpected movement. These use cases reflect real money and risk. Demurrage disputes are a long-running sore point between shippers and railroads, and timestamped sensor data could shift the burden of proof. Condition monitoring is becoming non-negotiable for high-value and regulated cargo. Theft and tampering alerts address a growing security concern in intermodal and bulk rail.

There is also a competitive dimension for logistics providers themselves. Respondents said they increasingly view visibility as a data layer from connected assets that supports faster decisions, stronger accountability, and more resilient supply chain operations. Almost three quarters—73%—rated real-time visibility of goods in transit as a high priority, and nearly one in five called it critical. That suggests service providers that can offer end-to-end rail visibility, particularly across the rail leg, can differentiate themselves in a crowded 3PL and freight brokerage market. Conversely, railroads that leave the data gap unfilled will continue to cede volume to trucking and to intermodal alternatives that can provide more granular tracking.