Ok, so I am a noob with regards to actually running prototype ops, so I have the following question/observation I am looking for help with. I noticed here in Tacoma, that some of the UP and BNSF trains have SP, CP and various other boxcars and hoppers in them. Is this because they were acquired and have not been relabelled? Or is it because they are taking these cars on their lines for a certain fee/lease? I am just in the process of staring to acquire freight cars and I was planning to stick mainly with UP cars, but if this was a common practice even in the 1940’s and 50’s, then I can expand and buy some more intersting rolling stock. Just wondering. Again, thanks for any help.
Brian
The cars you have seen are the result of what is called “Interchange”. Interchange is the process of fowarding freight over another carriers line, without changing the cars that the freight is carried in. For example. Its possible to see a Santa Fe Reefer that was filled with Oranges in California, in Vermont on oh lets say the Rutland, because that was that was where the oranges needed to be. once that reefer is empty it is supposed to be sent back along the same route it came from. (For simplictys sake, Lets say it got to vermont by a ATSF, NYC, RUT routing.) Now the RUT and the NYC have a vested interest in returning the car to the ATSF as soon as possible because every day that this car is on their railroad they have to pay a “Per Diem” charge. A “Per Diem” charge is basicly a Rental Fee for the use of one RRs cars by other RRs. However if the situation arose, that something could be sent back to california with the need of refridgeration, Say Fresh, Vermont Maple Syup, the Rutland can arrange to have the ATSF reefer loaded and sent on its way back as a loaded car so the Revenue form moving a loaded car, can help off set the “Per Diem” Charges incurred. However many cars were often returned to their home roads empty.
As for your freight car mix, As a general rule, I follow the Rule of Thirds.
The rule of thirds states that 1/3 of your rolling stock should be for your home road. In my case the GN. the next 1/3 should be of roads that are near by and have direct connections with your home road. In my case these would be CB&Q, NP, UP, MILW, and SP. With a little CN and CP from GN’s Canadian Connections. The Last one third should be everyone else.
I hope this information has been useful.
James
Thanks James, I always wondered about that myself.
James hit the nail right on the head.
I use a different ratio though. About 1/2 of my rolling stock comes Reading and D&H (my line co-owners). 1/4 from it’s principle connection, Canadian Pacific, Canadian National and Erie Lackawanna, (plus their subsidary companies). The last quarter is everything else.
Nick
The ratio of home road to foreign rolling stock is a function of several factors:
- How big is the home road? With todays megamergers, a lot more cars never leave home rails, so the proportion of home-road cars can go well above 50%. On the other hand, quite a few “fallen flag” cars are still running around the acquiring road in their original paint. I don’t doubt that there are quite a few ex-conrail cars on Norfolk Southern that still have Conrail schemes. UP and BNSF, having acquired all kinds of cars from their several mergers, are probably even more colorful in this respect.
- What is the major commodity being hauled? It’s a safe bet that Pocahontas coal loaded on the steam-era Norfolk and Western moved exclusively in N&W cars, and that was the major part of that road’s freight traffic. Boxcars on the N&W were more likely to be foreign cars, but their number was overwhelmed by the flood of coal.
- Is there some special circumstance involved. For a brief period, when per-diem charges made it worthwhile, some very small railroads fielded vast fleets of box cars. At least one of those lines literally did not have enough track to accommodate their cars if they somehow all returned to home rails at once. (In the 1980’s I saw long lines of home road cars on the McCloud River Railway, many of which didn’t appear to have moved in quite a while. The McCloud River was one of the lines in question, as was the otherwise-insignificant Bonhomie and Hattiesburg Southern.)
In my own case, the home road is a monopoly owned by the national government, so all cars are home road cars until proven otherwise. Even though there is some limited interchange with a privately-owned coal hauler, everything dispatched by that coal hauler that isn’t part of a unit train is loaded in National Railway gons and hoppers. Any car that can’t haul coal is National Railway property. I don’t know how per di
Perfect…just what I was looking for! Thanks guys. I was not sure if interchange only applied to certain cars not owned by the railroad OR both… It appears both… Thanks again!
Brian
For a “bridge” railroad like the Union Pacific, which got a lot of business by moving things from railroads on one end to railroads on the other end, foreign-road cars were even more common. Lots of interchange traffic. And the note about fallen flags is definitely true: whenever I take an Amtrak trip I regularly spot cars still wearing paint from railroads that have been gone fore 20 years or more!