This posting is going to be much more relevant to some of you than others, but for those of you who do have heavy large vehicles, hopefully it will be educational.  When you call a car shipping company and you need help transporting your large and/or heavy vehicle, having the exact dimensions is very important.  The weight and height are going to be the main things that determine what kind of trailer is needed to handle the move.  The tallest a vehicle can be on the road, for most states, is 13ft 6inches.  If the vehicle you need moved is, lets say 10,000 lbs, that is something that a regular small transport truck can handle.  The driver’s trailer will be able to take the weight of a unit only weighing 10,000 lbs and the the truck/tractor pulling it will have enough power to get it moved.  However, if you have a armored vehicle that weighs in at 20,000 lbs, only certain auto transport trailers will be equipped to handle a shipment like that.  A heavy load of that size is assigned to lowboy trailers or step-deck trailers.  Those trailers have the proper infrastructure to handle the weight of a unit like that.  Because the limited amount of freight that can be moved on lowboy trailers, the rate is high and space is a premium.  The rate will generally vary from $3-$7 per mile driven.

TWIC stands for Transportation Worker Identification Credential.  The TWIC card is needed by car transport drivers to get into the ports, if your car is inside the port.  It isn’t difficult for drivers to get a TWIC card, they need to pay a small fee, get a background check and jump through all the hoops in order to get this card.  If the driver doesn’t have a TWIC card or is still in the application process, he can pay a fee at the port, usually around $150 and he can be escorted into and out of the port.  There of course is a fee that is then passed onto the customer or built into the initial price quote for transport.  As port security is a large part of our national security, the TWIC card is designed to ensure that all the auto shippers going into the port don’t pose any threat to our port or our country.