Amtrak has about 350 locomotives and 2000 passenger cars.
Norfolk Southern has about 3500 locomotives.
A passenger car is about as complex as a locomotive - new ones cost about the same.
Norfolk Southern has about 160,000 freight cars to look after each day, on top of this.
Amtrak runs about 300 trains a day. Norfolk Southern runs about 500 road trains and an equal number of locals a day.
Norfolk Southern has about 30,000 employees. About 12,000 of NS’s are T&E employees, about 3500 are management.
Amtrak has about 20,000.
One more comparison.
In 1980, after Conrail got rid of commuter service, they had about 60,000 employees. At the end in 1998, they had 18,000 employees. Traffic was pretty close to flat over this time period.
Amtrak, in 1980, had about 20,000 employees and the same number in 1998. Traffic was pretty much flat over this time period.
And this comparison of apples and oranges proves what? NS is a freight railroad, owns the track it runs on, is basically limited to the track it owns, is a stockholder business, it is a business that has changed in size by acquiring and merging with other railroads, has had changes in make up of traffic as well as traffic patterns. Amtrak is a government owned entity which owns some of its track but runs on private enterprise railroads for much of its mileage, it is in the business of moving people instead of freight, because it is a passenger operation it is also more labor intensive, it is a nationwide operation and not confined to its owned tracks. It would be more fair to compare Amtrak to Greyhound bus or American Airlines than to a regional freight railroad. And more fair to compare NS to any other regional freight railroad in the country.
What jumps out at me in looking at Amtrak and any freight railroad is that Amtrak is unique in our history. It is an attempt at a cooperative venture between our government which operates a national passenger railroad and a whole bunch of private for profit companies, the freight railroads. As Amtrak reminded us on its 40th anniversary, so far it has worked. And it has worked despite changes in political priorities for the last 40 years. I believe that is a significant accomplishment for both Amtrak and the host railroads. For all of that I would like to see it work even better.
There are people who call for us to abandon Amtrak So argue that we should let the private sector run our passenger railroads; that argument is ridiculous. If the private sector wanted to run passenger railroads private companies would still be doing that. No company was forced to join Amtrak and some held out but all of the private companies ultimately did give over their rail operations to Amtrak.
Short of freight railroads wanting to take back passenger service we need to work to improve the relationship between Amtrak and our freight railroads. Today freight railroads are facing new challengers. Coal which has been a mainstay almost since they begin is drying up. But they are moving more and more into general freight in containers which they can move long distances far more cheaply than motor trucks do. And this is their oldest function: To be a bridge from tidewater to consumers. And consumers are precisely the people who might all be railroad passengers. Serving consumers is the common goal of Amtrak and freight railroads. We should not forget it.
It’s a fair comparison because NS does more than double the work of Amtrak with more than double the amount of equivalent equipment with more than double the track miles…
With only 50% more people.
It’s also fair because, while the rail industry got productive - Amtrak’s productivity stayed flat.
It’s not apple to oranges. More like Granny Smith to Red Delicious.
“Worked” is pushing it. Outside of the NEC and it’s extensions and some state supported stuff, “Survived” is probably a better description.
Another thing to consider… Right now, Amtrak is claiming a modest “green” advantage over autos - their main competitor. But, what will things look like in 10 years? The CAFE standards will double the fuel efficiency of cars which will flip the advantage to autos. What is Amtrak doing to improve train fuel economy? Are they pushing for lighter weight equipment? Anything?
Two entirely different animals…neither is a reflection of the other, two different products and services. Amtrak doesn’t haul coal and NS doesn’t haul people, etc. You might just as well compare NS to any city transit system or commuter agency. and you’d be closer to comparison because at least it would be regional.
Amttak reports that at present–not years down the road but right now–it uses fuel 30 per cent more efficiently than automobiles and it is working of ways to improve the efficiency.
Of course many of Amtrak’s trains are electric trains which would be comparable to plug in electric cars. However, at present we don’t have many plug in electric trains.
In an interesting note Amtrak points out that freight trains use fuel about 11 times more efficiently than motor trucks. If you know anything at all about the physics of friction the idea that a rubber tire on a road can compete with a steel wheel on a steel rail makes no sense.
Amtrak needs 2000+ mgt employees to operated 300 trains a day. NS needs 3500 to operate 1000 trains a day. How does what’s in the train matter that much in this regard?
Well, I should know a bit about physics. I am a Mechanical Engineer by education and have done quite a few diesel engine efficiency and locomotive fuel consumption tests in my day.
And, you’d be right about the rolling resistance if we were comparing trains with rubber tires to trains with steel wheels. But, we’re not.
The problem is weight. The FRA says, that in order to operate in a mixed environment, you have to build your passenger cars to withstand 800,000 buff force without deformation, plus a few other requirements like collision posts that make US passenger cars much heavier than contemporary high speed train sets in Europe, for example. An Amfleet car is about 55 tons empty. It holds 76 passenger in short haul configuration. That’s 1500 # per seat. For a six car train with a P42 on one end and a cabbage on the other and a 60% load factor, that comes out to 4500# per passenger. Three people in a Camry comes out to 1100# per passenger.
And, the trend is not going Amtrak’s way. The current set of
For openers, I would safely state that most NS freights have a two-man crew. A short-haul Amtrak train will have at least a three-man operating crew plus those providing on-board services. If you are a very good labor negotiator, you MAY be able to reduce the crew requirements for Amtrak, but I doubt it.
Amtrak has never had a reason to bargain very hard. In fact, allowing expensive “NY Dock” style labor protection gives Amtrak’s LD trains an effective “poison pill”. You have to pay the labor whether or not the train still runs - for years. This also gives Amtrak mgt a measure of job security - the more people there are to manage, the more managers you need.
Yes. 100% of Amtrak employees work for a passenger railroad and 100% of NS employees work for a freight railroad… 100% of the territory covered by Amtrak is the entire country. 100% of the territory coverd by NS is about 1/3 of the country. 100% of the stock in Amtrak is owned by the Federal government. 100% of the stock of NS is owned by private individuals. I don’t understand your not understanding the differences between these two and why you cannot compare the two on an even basis.
Comparing the efficiency of NS to other railroads or the commercial freight hauling business in general is relatively easy. Investors do it every day. It is called the stock market.
Greyhound, Megabus, Boltbus, etc. have to cover their costs or go out of business. The same applies to the nation’s airlines.
Amtrak does not have to cover its costs. It just has to convince the taxpayers to underwrite it. Having said that, if Amtrak could drop the long distance trains, rationalize it management and organizational structure, align its services to what people are willing to pay for, it probably could cover its operating costs. Moreover, if it were placed on a level playing field, which would require some radical changes, it probably could cover its capital costs.
I am keen to see if the proposed private operators, i.e. Texas, Florida, Italy, can show that there is another way than the Amtrak mode.
From memory I believe the Federal Government controls the preferred stock of the National Railroad Passenger Corporation. Some of the common stock is still held by the railroads or investors. More than 70% of NS shares are held by institutional investors, i.e. pension funds, mutual funds, etc. The percentage of the stock held directly by individuals is relatively small.
I honestly don’t care who runs inter-city passenger trains service in this country, Amtrak or someone else, public or private. Given the limitations Amtrak is burdened with (mandated routes based on political clout, Irrational and outdated service model, overstaffing, inept management) it actually does pretty well on the whole. But if we want real improvements so that we have a modern service, radical changes will be needed. The problem with train advocacy is that there remains a zealous faction who desire a model that hasn’t existed for over 60 years and denounce as bus shills or anti-train any and all who desire a different outcome. Good luck with the former. However, the rest of us will not be silenced…
“It’s not their fault” won’t fix anything. I really DON’T think it’s their fault. They are a creature molded by their circumstance to become nearly what their worst critics call them. If they don’t wake up and get moving, it will be their undoing, however. Nasty times are coming.
Yeah, I know the Feds hold a major % of NRP stock and the initial railroads the rest, someting like 7% or less. And I know insutiturions, etc, own a majority of the private railroad stock and individuals less. ANd i know Amtrak has to deal with freight railroads and NS has to deal with Amtrak and commuter agencies. But the fact is that Amtrak is so different from NS that there is no way to campare except for the guage of the track and the fuel in the non electric locomotives are the same.
Because of running passenger trains, Amtrak is by its nature more labor intensive than a freight only line. That said, running an engine is pretty similar, whether passenger or freight. So are many other jobs. And NS must maintain far more miles of track than Amtrak does. The point is that Amtrak has not been able to implement many operating efficiencies of the past 20 years that NS and other railroads have. Why not? Efficiencies would allow Amtrak to offer more service where that was a rational course of action without depending on an appropriation.
For many years railroads faced a special problem with government regulation which almost regulated them out of business. The Staggers Act in 1980 was supposed to do away with that. But I guess there is still problematic regulation for Amtrak. I would like to see regulations revised to more reasonable standards but the point here is that if Amtrak does go out of business the reason is that it has been regulated out of business and not because of anything Amtrak did or did not do.
As far as engine standards go, it is hard for me to understand why we can improve efficiency in engines that go into automobiles but we cannot improve efficiency in engines that go into locomotives.