Street turns: reusing an import empty for an export load

What a street turn is

An import container normally makes two trips with your truck. You pull it loaded from the terminal, deliver it to the consignee, wait for it to be unloaded, then haul the empty back to the terminal or to a depot the provider names. Somewhere else in the same metro area, an exporter needs an empty container of the same kind, so another truck goes to the terminal, pulls an empty and takes it to the shipper to be loaded.

A street turn joins those two moves. The empty from the import is taken directly to the export shipper, loaded, and delivered to the terminal for the outbound vessel. The container never makes the empty trip back. The term comes from the box being turned "on the street" rather than at the terminal. The same idea applies to a chassis: if the chassis stays under the container, the chassis is turned as well.

Two business terms sit behind every street turn. The first is interchange: the handover of physical possession of equipment between the provider and a motor carrier. The federal definition (49 CFR 390.5T) describes interchange as providing intermodal equipment to a motor carrier under a written interchange agreement for loading, unloading or repositioning. The second is the interchange agreement itself. For most North American intermodal equipment that is the Uniform Intermodal Interchange and Facilities Access Agreement (UIIA), which the federal definition names, plus each equipment provider's own addendum.

Why carriers and shippers want them

The savings are in moves that never happen:

For a drayage carrier that means more loaded moves per truck per day and fewer hours sitting in terminal queues. On the import side it can stop the per diem clock earlier, because the box leaves the import interchange as soon as the turn is accepted, which matters to whoever ends up paying that per diem. For the export customer it removes the risk of finding no empties at the terminal on the day they need one. Ports and terminals benefit from fewer empty gate transactions. This is why many providers allow street turns, even though each one asks them to give up a little control over where their equipment goes.

What has to line up

A street turn is a match between two bookings. Before you dispatch one, check each of these. If any is missing, return the empty the normal way.

• Same equipment provider. The export booking has to be with the shipping line (or other provider) that owns or controls the import container. A line will not accept another line's box on its export booking.
• Size and type. A 40-foot high cube cannot fill a booking for a standard 40-foot container unless the line allows the substitution. Reefers, flat racks, open tops and tanks each need their own match.
• Condition and cleanliness. The box has to be fit for the export cargo: clean, dry, odor-free and undamaged. If the import cargo leaves residue or the container picked up damage, it may need cleaning or repair that the provider must authorize first.
• Timing. The export must be ready to load within the free time left on the import side, or the provider must agree to how the free time transfers. A box that sits in your yard for a week waiting for an export load is still on the import clock.
• Provider approval. Most providers require a request and approval for each street turn, through their own portal or a shared industry platform. Some charge a fee, set in their addendum.
• Chassis. If the chassis stays under the box, the chassis provider's rules apply too. A chassis from one pool may not be allowed to move a container for a line that uses another.
• Both motor carriers authorized. If the export is hauled by a different drayage company, that company must have its own interchange relationship with the provider.

What the interchange agreement says

The UIIA does not use the phrase "street turn" in its main terms, but several of its definitions decide how one works. These references are to the version effective June 18, 2026, published by the Intermodal Association of North America (IANA):

• Interchange is the transfer of physical possession of equipment under the agreement (section B.18).
• The Interchange Period starts when the equipment is interchanged to the motor carrier and ends when it is interchanged back to the provider or to another motor carrier that the provider authorizes for interchange (B.19).
• Return. The motor carrier returns equipment to the location where it was received, unless the provider directs it to a satellite location listed in IANA's Equipment Return Location Directory (E.1.b). It may also interchange the equipment to another motor carrier that the provider authorizes, in the same condition, reasonable wear and tear excepted (D.3.e).
• Per diem is the charge when equipment is not returned by the end of its free time to its origin or another location the provider specifies, or, at the provider's discretion, interchanged to another motor carrier. A charge that fits that description counts as per diem whether it is called per diem, detention or something else (B.23).
• Equipment Interchange Receipts record the equipment and any visible damage at the time of interchange, on paper or electronically (D.2).

The commercial details belong to each provider's addendum. The UIIA's addenda template lists "Street Turn" among the administrative fees a provider may include (template section III.E), along with free time rules, per diem schedules and the provider's dispute process. So two lines at the same port can have quite different street-turn rules, and the place to read them is the addendum, not the master agreement.

IANA also runs a Street Interchange Application for UIIA participants. On its own description, the application records the transfer of liability, damage and indemnification from the originating motor carrier to the receiving one, stops the clock on the import move and starts it on the export move for street turns, and checks that the receiving motor carrier has a valid UIIA interchange with the providers involved. Whether you use it, or a provider's own portal, depends on the provider.

Risks: per diem, liability and paperwork

The point of a street turn is to save money and time. It goes wrong in predictable ways:

• Turning without approval. If the provider never accepted the turn, its records still show the box on your import interchange. Per diem keeps accruing to you, and the export move may be refused at the terminal, leaving you to bring the loaded box back.
• The clock that did not move. Even with approval, check that the import clock actually stopped. Under the UIIA the provider invoices per diem within sixty days of the equipment's return and you have thirty days to respond in writing with your evidence (E.6.c and E.6.f), so a missed turn shows up late, after you may have already billed your customer.
• Damage between the two moves. Damage that happens between the import delivery and the export pickup has to be on someone's receipt. If the box changes hands between two motor carriers, photograph it and record its condition at handover, the same way you would at a terminal gate.
• Wrong box for the booking. A container that does not match the export booking can be rolled at the terminal. Confirm the booking number, size and type against the container before it is loaded.
• Customer billing. If you charged the importer for an empty return that never happened, or the exporter for an empty pickup you did not make, fix the invoices. Street turns change which accessorials apply.

How to record a street turn

Treat the street turn as a move on the container, not as a note in a text thread. A clean record has:

1. The import container number, the import bill of lading or reference, and the date the import delivery was completed.
2. The export booking number the container is being turned onto, and the shipper's pickup location.
3. The provider's approval reference, and the date and time it was given.
4. The condition of the container and chassis at the point of the turn, with photos.
5. Any street-turn fee and who pays it.
6. The date the loaded export was gated into the terminal, which closes the container's interchange.

Keep that record with the load it belongs to, so that when a per diem invoice arrives months later, you can show when the turn was approved and when the export went in. The demurrage, detention and per diem guide covers how those container charges are counted, and the last free day article covers the deadlines on the import side.

How TruckerPro records street turns

TruckerPro's Intermodal and Drayage workspace, on the Elite plan and up and switched on in company Settings, treats each container as a job. Street turn is one of the moves you can add to a container, alongside import pickup, customer delivery, empty return and export delivery, and a move can be linked to a dispatch leg. A street turn cannot be completed until the empty return location and reference are entered on the container, and like other pickup moves it is blocked until your team has recorded the release, terminal access and equipment checks as clear or not required. Every change is logged as an event on the container. TruckerPro does not connect to terminal or shipping-line systems: the approval itself comes from the provider, and your team records its reference.