Alan Shaw: Yeah, and well, let me start by reminding everybody, those lives are just for the fourth quarter, so to speak, near-term outlook. Here’s what we’ve seen. We’ve seen an acceleration in projects associated with manufacturing, probably seen some tail-off or deceleration in projects associated with warehousing and I think that’s a direct function of some of the pressure that’s coming from interest rates out there. But, you think about whether it’s aggregates, whether it’s lumber, whether it’s structural steel, there is a lot of pent-up demand out there to move product into these building sites. You think about any energy-intensive industry around the world, if you want to be in a place that is not only ecologically responsible, but has reliable, stable, predictable, affordable energy, and great infrastructure to connect you to the rest of the world, the U.S. is compelling.
The eastern U.S. is very compelling with its customer base, and the southeast is exceptionally compelling for those.
Operator: Our final question is from the line of David Vernon with Bernstein. Please proceed with your question.
David Vernon: Hey, good morning, guys, and thanks for the call today. So, Mark, I wanted to go back to one of your earlier comments about sort of expecting average incrementals when volumes do turn. I’m just trying to figure out how I can get comfortable with that, thinking about costs being structurally higher and some of the mixed headwinds that Ed’s pointing to in terms of both the short-haul intermodal, bringing back more international entities into the network, and seasoning some of these new intermodal services. Is that average incrementals, is that sort of the day one when volume turns, or should we be thinking about that more as the middle part of the cycle when we think about incremental margins? Thank you.
Alan Shaw: Yeah, look, I think we’ve had a challenging mixed environment here the past couple quarters that have been consuming a lot of the positive pricing, core pricing that Ed and his team have been capturing. At some point, that mixed headwind will reverse, it usually does. But as we think sequentially going into Q4, we’re going to have some of the structural headwinds for sure, but that should be offset by the temporary costs related to the service. So I think we’re kind of neutral there. And then we’re not going to have the same type of fuel headwinds that we had in the third quarter. In fact, I don’t think, I think it could be probably flat neutral, maybe slightly, slightly positive. So really, we’re talking about volume dropping through.
We have seen a nice uptick sequentially in volume, and that should drop through with those normal incrementals of call it 60% or plus. So that’s the way I think about Q4 and then longer term, things should play out that way. In any given quarter, obviously, mix is playing a role and hopefully, it’s not adverse going into 2024, the way it’s been here these past couple few quarters.
Operator: This concludes the question and answer session. I’ll now turn the call back over to Mr. Alan Shaw for closing comments.
Alan Shaw: We certainly appreciate your participation and your questions this morning. Thanks for joining.
Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your participation. This does conclude today’s teleconference. You may now disconnect your lines and have a wonderful day.
