The Pool of Pools
Offering Interoperability of Chassis Between Chassis Pools
The "Pool of Pools" (POP) is a multi-pool agreement between the three major proprietary marine container chassis pools operating in the San Pedro Basin port complex. DCLP, TPSP and FLBP developed this agreement in response to port stakeholder desires to create greater chassis fluidity across the port complex, which is by far the largest in the United States. The POP structure delivers streamlined operations while retaining the benefits of proprietary pools, including robust competition, asset owner oversight of maintenance and repair, and service that can be tailored directly to customer needs.
The POP encompasses a combined fleet of over 56,000 marine container chassis with mutual start/stop locations covering eleven (11) major marine terminals and four (4) major rail facilities, through which the vast majority of container cargo is transported into or out of Southern California. Following initial development and the completion of a business review letter process with the United States Department of Justice, the POP began operations in March 2015, and has now been operating successfully for over seven (7) years.
Within POP operations, any chassis contributed to the DCLP, TPSP or FLBP fleet can be utilized by authorized users in all of the participating pools. POP chassis may be interchanged out or returned to any of the fifteen (15) start/stop locations. For example, a chassis interchanged at a marine terminal in Long Beach may be returned to a rail ramp in Los Angeles. Prior to the POP, chassis in different pools were segregated at facilities for use only by certain user bases, and returnable only to a portion of the facilities otherwise available to receive chassis.
The POP also provides a unique and unprecedented amount of publicly-available and regularly-updated data regarding aggregate chassis availability, usage and related metrics for the POP fleet. Please consult the "Reports" section of this website for more details.
