Shipping a 2023 Honda HR-V from KY to AZ

A recent transport saw a 2023 Honda HR-V transported from Lexington, Kentucky, to Phoenix, Arizona. It took the compact SUV on an open truck for 1,796 miles costing a total of $1,250.00. This means that the price per mile was about $0.70. The price is fairly efficient for a long-distance delivery because the costs of delivering goods across states are usually spread over more miles than those of short distance.

One of the most common cross-state transports in the US is that which takes place through the I-40 corridor. Through this transport, you can get an idea of how much it costs to transport items between these states and the factors that influence that price. Here’s how the whole process looks like.

Table of Contents

The Route

Lexington, KY, 40504 to Phoenix, AZ, 85019

The route from Lexington to Phoenix is based on the Interstate 40 route, one of the major north-south routes in the country. Shippers tend to go in a westerly direction towards Nashville and the Midwest. They will then connect through Missouri and Oklahoma and get to the I-40 route somewhere around Oklahoma City. After that they will travel west on the long Interstate 40 route from Amarillo, New Mexico, to Albuquerque and then through Arizona.

The last leg will take them south to Phoenix. The I-40 will be going through Flagstaff and then the carriers switch to the I-17 and take the road south through the mountains down to the Valley of the Sun, where Phoenix is located. There will be quite an elevation change, since Flagstaff is at a fairly high elevation and Phoenix is down in the lowlands.

Transit time on this route will usually be four to six days, because all the highways are major interstates that are open year round. However, the fact that the end point is at the elevation change and the weather can affect the I-40 route in winter should be taken into account.

Why Long-Distance Shipping Costs Less Per Mile

At a price of $0.70 for each mile on this trip, it shows that auto transport pricing depends on the distance of the run. While long runs cost higher overall, shorter ones cost more per mile because fixed costs such as loading time and routing get spread out over many miles.

Short-distance transportation, for example 300 miles, can cost over $1.00 per mile, whereas a long-distance one like the present case, at 1,796 miles, comes in at about $0.70. This is due to the fact that there is an interstate journey that is easy to load with many trailers, keeping the cost low. Both the pickup point, Lexington, and the drop-off location, Phoenix, are located near or within urban areas, hence no remote area fee was charged.

Another reason is the smaller size of the HR-V. Being a compact-sized vehicle means that it fits on the open hauler well without using any extra deck space.

Open Transport

Open transportation is the default option when it comes to the transportation of vehicles, and it is perfect for Honda HR-V in particular. The vehicle will be transported in an open multi-car trailer, which is the type that we see transporting cars on the highways on a daily basis. Open multi-car trailers can load up to nine or ten cars at once, spreading out the expenses and making them lower than those of enclosed vehicles.

However, such transportation means some exposure to elements on the way since cars are not protected and exposed to any weather conditions like rain or road debris while sitting on an open deck. However, this is not really much of an issue for most cars since the exposure is minimal compared to the cost of enclosed transportation.

For a 2023 Honda HR-V that will be driven around everyday, it makes logical sense that open transport should be utilized. The SUV is designed for normal road driving, which means that by transporting it across the country through open transport, it gets exposed to far less than what it would experience while driving the 1,796 miles.