ACT T50 2007: North America's largest specialized transport companies

Starting from scratch, last year at this time the editors at American Cranes & Transport created its benchmark ACT transport 50. The goal in 2006 was to produce a credible listing of North America's largest specialized transport companies. And that we did with some 40 companies making that first list. This year we are proud to bring to our readers a much expanded list with 59 companies represented and ranked by fleet size and capacity. Our second attempt at this list gave us new insight in data collection and interpretation of the business of specialized transport.

Again this year, we went the extra mile, ranking companies in this listing in two ways – first by fleet size and then by total maximum transport capacity by weight of all relevant equipment in a company's fleet. The ranking is based on information supplied by the companies according to a standard inquiry form completed by those companies and returned to ACT.

While we have worked to produce the most accurate ranking possible, we cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information supplied. As with the ACT50 listing of the largest crane-owning companies, the idea is that with each successive edition, the list is improved, largely thanks to input from readers. Comments and suggestions are encouraged.

The heavy transport market has two main segments: heavy and specialized transport by road; and – where often higher loads are involved – heavy transport on jobsites, which reflects in the total tonnage and forms the basis for our list.

It also should be noted that some companies in the list offer services in the heavy load movement sector that are not in the rubber tired trailer or transport category. In the future, we may consider including additional classifications of ranking specialized and heavy transport capacities, and we encourage reader input on how we can make this list better and more useful. In addition, there are many other companies that provide specialized transport via waterways. We are assessing ways to add these companies to our listing or creating separate listings for these types of services.

Your comments and suggestions on ways to improve the ACT transport 50 and any other aspect of the magazine are welcome. While there is room to expand and improve the ACT transport 50, we try hard to get as many replies as possible by encouraging hundreds of potentially relevant companies to fill out and return the application form. This year we mailed forms to more than 750 companies. That said, while we have managed to increase the number of companies in our ranking, we realize our work is not complete. With the help of readers and those companies that did not respond to our call for information, we can expand and improve the list again next year.

Additionally, in some cases firms included in our list last year did not re-submit information this year. We decided to include their 2006 information as estimates, giving these companies a year's grace period. As with all our database development, we made every effort to ensure the accuracy and completeness of this information but take no responsibility for errors, omissions or incomplete information.