Its not an acronym but a logo…it stands for the heritage railroads. Buffet on Ballast, Hathaway Hath Righ Of Way, and other cute names like that ain’t gonna cut it in the railroad world.
How about Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle & Pensacola, CLASP for short? Or the Florida, Illinois, Washington & California?
BuNSiF??
How 'bout…BurlFe?
Boy I got a real good snort out of that!
How about the Great Western Railway?
The official name of the railway has been the BNSF Railway since 2005. It’s no longer the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway it seems. The parent holding corporation still seems to officially call itself the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corporation though.
So while I know we’re all aware of what those four letters represent, I don’t think we should attach any sentiment to them when as far as the railway is concerned they’re just four letters rather than a abbreviation representing something greater.
And that it got this way suggests that their traditional name wasn’t simple enough in the first place. It doesn’t even sound nice when you say it since it’s simply too long. Everyone abbreviated it in writing and everyone either spoke the abbreviation itself or let their loyalties be known by just continuing to the call the merged company the Santa Fe or the Burlington Northern.
Unlike some classic names in the past like the Seaboard Coast Line and Burlington Northern, this attempt to combine two historic names in one fell flat on its face immediately.
I don’t think that Burlington Northern Santa Fe is any longer or more unwieldy than:
Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe
or
Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific
or
Chicago, Burlington and Quincy
or any of many other RRs that took a name by combining the names of the cities it served or which direction they went (or wanted to imply they were going to go).
They eventually all get abbreviated to just the initials of the city names (ATSF, CMStP&P, CB&Q), or to just one city name (Santa Fe, Milwaukee, Burlington) or just one letter of the alphabet soup (the ‘Q’), by either the Media, Employees, the P.R. department, or Wall Street, for expedience sake.
And as the companies have merged, bought out, sold out, traded, or emerged from a bankruptcy with a major or minor change to the corporate name (such as changing “Railroad” to “Railway”, or vice versa), the legacy and heritage names are often retained for legal reasons (trademark retention and to preclude some legal wrangling over the wording of contracts and deeds that might get overlooked in filing the merger, purchase, sale, or bankruptcy proceeding).
BTW, I pronounce 'em: " BiN-SiFf ", and " yoUP ".
But I think you will find that those full names were relatively rarely used. And they had a major advantage in that they lent themselves to shortened names far superior to that of just a four letter acronym. Santa Fe, the Milwaukee (Or the Milwaukee Road), and the Burlington (And sometimes just the “Q” and on rare occasion the Burlington Route) were extremely common. Surely you can agree that four letters in the form of BNSF lack a little something compared to those.
Furthermore, those lines were never referenced as the ATSF and such when speaking. Those were just reporting marks on rolling stock and an abbreviation while writing that never became nearly as ubiquitous as BNSF quickly universally became outside of company letterhead and such (The 70 Years of Trains Magazine DVD for instance shows 4067 hits for Santa Fe while ATSF shows only 1979 hits; Compare that with BNSF appearing 3860 times with Burlington Northern Santa Fe appearing a mere 362 times… which I’ve subtracted from the Santa Fe total). And when spoken verbally, it would’ve universally been the Santa Fe or even the full name on occasion which makes it even more lopsided and I’m quite sure BNSF’s full name appeared even more rarely verbally than it has in print.
In the case of the ‘Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific’, the shortened name that was sort of a nickname of sort that railfans of today remember best appeared quickly officially appeared after the official name was adapted since the directors recognized that the long official name of the line was a bit unwieldy. So it’s best remembered as the Milwaukee Road today.
Hard to see how anyone could ever put up a fight in the
Leo, I am well aware of the BNSF name. And I did not indicate my presentation was the name of the railroada but what BNSF stood for… I was pointing to the fact that BNSF stood for those proud heritage names. That is what this post is about…name for the railroad. I did not give any name to the railroad but just explained what the letters stood for and why those letters should remain the name of the railroad. And I want to underscore the fact that the most important asset of the railroad. are it’s long time present and former employees. To give them recongnition and respect will go a long way in keeping the railroad vital and running.; perhaps more so than stockholder and investor money.
I’m surprised they went with BNSF in the first place because its so similar to BASF.
And that didn’t require any clarification in the slightest. I merely was pointing out that officially, those letters don’t stand for a more formal name any longer. The official name of the railway is BNSF Railway. It is not the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway any longer. BNSF is not an abbreviation as of 2005.
As for the rest of what I’ve been saying in this thread, I stand by it. A name is lousy when the initials have almost been universally used instead since day 1. And the system is quickly closing on 20 years since the merger so I don’t think equal recognition of the two major components of the system is very necessary in the current company name.
Frankly, I think that their heritage would be better delivered to their employees and the public in a program like Norfolk Southern’s while giving the company its own moniker with a name that stands proudly with the best that we’ve seen in American railroading rather than with an identify that is a mishmash of two different companies with long and varied histories that doesn’t mean much on its own and which has been relegated universally to a mere four letters when identified orally or in print.
I would bet that if you asked any employee of BNSF what the initials stand for they would puff up in pride and tell you. But if you were to ask anyone on Wall St. the answer would be a cold set of questions concerning how the stock is doing and what is the rate of return on investment , and a snide comment that it isn’t a railroad they commute on. No, B N S F are proud letters speaking volumes about their heritage and are not a 20 year old set of letters devoid of meaning.
I suspect the average railroad employee really doesn’t care what name is on the flanks of their locomotives.
Omaha Steak & Cort Furniture Transpotation?
Actually, they kind of have to know - for radio transmissions/track authorities/warrants, that sort of stuff. But I guess they can always look at the magic blue paper for that.
I didn’t say that they were oblivious to it. But I would wager a bet that the modern 21st century railroad employee doesn’t really have any emotional attachment to what name may or may not be on side of their locomotives.
I would advise Buffet to choose between two simple names:
Burlington Sante Fe
or
Everywhere West
An objection to the first may be that it disregards the heritage of the NP and GN. My answer is that the railroad serves Galvaston as well as Spokane, and inclusion of the word northern limits the tag geogrraphically. Most old reporting marks had three letters, NYC, NKP, PRR, etc, so BSF is to me better than BNSF, and three words are not too long to remember as a name, four are too long.
Everywhere West. A good description of BNSF’s current operations, and a fitting response to the resoance and truth in the Union Pacific label.
And the reporting marks can be EW !
Wait a minute…
I asked a BNSF switch man that question today. He just shrugged and said “Burlington Northern”. He didn’t exactly seem puffed up with pride.
If we’re concerned about heritage, how far back do we want to go? We should have enough room on the sides of the locomotives for
CB&Q,GN,NP,SP&S,SL&SF,AT&SF
but I’m sure I left somebody out.
historically belongs to UP, but how about “The Omaha”?