Rubber Meeting the Road for Careers in BC’s Trucking and Logistics Sector

22 Eagle River and JL Jackson Secondary students got to see big wheels moving this week as they toured three trucking & logistic operations in Kamloops.

This was the first time SD83 careers partnered with this industry consortium to feature careers in the field. The featured employers were The LOTS Group, Arrow Transportation Systems and Bandstra Transportation Systems.

LOTS Group is a global logistics/transportation company based out of Sweden with a small branch in Kamloops. The company’s main focus is to repair trucks, trailers and forestry equipment in the region. They have commercial transport and heavy duty technicians shifted for seven days a week, 17 hours a day in their shop to ensure trucks and other equipment can get back on the road. Students got a tour of their shop and yard and were able to see an electric hoist in action.

One of Arrow’s facilities is located on CPKC property near the South Thompson River. Students were able to climb into a large truck and forklift and were taken on a large trailer around the yard as forklifts loaded dimensional lumber onto train cars. Students were able to check out its logistics system as well where they could track trucks hauling freight across the province in real time.

Brandstra’s Kamloops operation is one of several across the province where many of their truck drivers do daily routes hauling thousands of different goods from groceries to hazardous waste to iron mine balls used for crushing rock at many of the interior’s mine operations. As Transportation Manager Brennan Driedger stated, “if you can touch it, a truck probably brought it.”

Like many other sectors, the trucking and logistic industry has tremendous challenges ahead when it comes to a future labour supply. Arrow’s Kamloops Site Manager Rob Davies says at any given day in the country, there are over one-million trucks and truck drivers moving goods. Despite this, the industry is currently 20-thousand drivers short. With the reality the median age of drivers Canada-wide is in the 50’s, Davis says the time will come where the shortage of drivers will become acute unless more people choose to consider these jobs as a career. As well, industry experts acknowledged during our tour AI and autonomous vehicles will eventually take over these jobs but, at earliest, the reality is still 20-30 years away especially in more challenging driving environments like BC because of its terrain and winter temperatures. Wages for full-time long-haul truck drivers range between 100 & 200-thousand dollars a year depending on various factors.

If you have ideas to feature certain professions to our students, please contact George Richard at 778-824-1188 via text or call or you can email grichard@sd83.bc.ca.