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Canadian Pacific expresses extreme disappointment with Canadian Government grain legislation
Once they fill the hoppers are there enough silos or bins to store the grain at the end of the route?
ON THIS SUBJECT VOTE BUYING POLITICIANS ACHIEVE NOTHING…GOVERNMENTS MUST MIND THEIR OWN CORRUPT DOINGS FIRST AND THEN IN 2040 OR 2050 TAKE ON AND FIX THE RAILWAYS…,MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS MR & MRS GOVERNMENT PEOPLE…
Come on Hunter,put your big boy pants on and fix this
Ok lets move all this grain by truck.
Move the grain by truck !!! LOL
No drivers and you won’t be able to afford the food prices.
Not knowing the whole story, but it sounds like there could be people in positions of power without the qualifications to be there. Too many times in government I have seen people elected or appointed to a position when not having the background to make truly informed decisions.
There is an easy solution to this problem, but I don’t think either the railroads or the gov’t would really appreciate it. Plain and simple, Just halt the shipment of all other commodities and only move grain. Let all the other industries in Canada layoff their ‘voting’ employees, until the railroads have moved all the grain as required. Of course then when the grain shows up at the end terminal, which will soon be swamped and unable to handle it, the Canadian Gov’t can step in and order the terminals to quit stalling and get the grain moving. In the mean time all the rest if Canada is sitting at home or at their local pubs and wondering what the hell their gov’t is doing. There’ll be a quick change of power in the next national election. If they would just do it.
The study of history should be outlawed. Clearly, governments do not learn that regulation of rates and arrangements damage the system and never work. Government always has the same answer: “we know far better how to run a business, even though we have no experience in making money”. Good luck Canada!
I’m not an ideologue, but I can’t help but contrast the cogent array of facts in context provided by Mr. Harrison and Mr. Mongeau with the context-free sound bites provided by politicians (of any persuasion), and increasingly, mainstream media (ditto).
This is piece of legislation which has only one purpose and that is to appease farmers a year before an election. Most likely , it will not become law before the next election is called. If it is it will be before the courts and may well be struck down. For years farmers in western Canada have wanted others to pay for their grain to be shipped. They do not want to pay for storing it either. They need a reality check
This is piece of legislation which has only one purpose and that is to appease farmers a year before an election. Most likely , it will not become law before the next election is called. If it is it will be before the courts and may well be struck down. For years farmers in western Canada have wanted others to pay for their grain to be shipped. They do not want to pay for storing it either. They need a reality check
Hunter Harrison and Claude Mongeau are on the same page on this one, and rightly so. Export grain movement is related to throughput flow rates at the ports and the ability of the railways to operate an adequate number of grain hoppers with sufficient locomotives and crews to move it. Seasonal conditions affect the railways’ ability to move traffic of all types, not just grain. It would appear that real world considerations do not enter into knee-jerk reactive political action.
I sympathize with any grain farmer who is sitting on a crop that he will not receive payment for until it is delivered. The new grain season is about to begin and the affected grain growers have a cash flow issue which impedes preparation for planting this year’s crop.
Nevertheless, blame the railways has been the growers’ tune since the railways were constructed. This action by the current Canadian government is purely political in nature as it panders to their electoral base in the grain growing areas of Canada.
22 million additional tons adds up to 1500 additional 15,000-ton trains on two networks that are already saturated. That is going to put a strain on any rail network, even if the railways split the additional traffic in half in order to cope. Heavy-haul capacity doesn’t come cheap. Mr Harrison is correct in his assessment that it will take a year for both railways to clear the backlog.
All this government interference does is complicate thing to no good effect. Time for a reality check, folks.
Like the US, there has been under-investment because the managements are overly concerned with quarterly profits, not long-term planning.
There is little redundancy or resilience witn any of the railroads, whether you look at equipment, crews or capacity.
This is the reason why there is no capacity for Amtrak or VIA to have more frequent services. Shippers suffer the same fate.
Ah!, but the solons in Ottawa know all, being from great grain-producing provinces of Quebec and Ontario. They are still smarting from the dissolution of the political Canadian Wheat Board. We, in the US, can’t handle any more Canadian grain on our system, at this time. When the longshoremen, in BC, stage their annual strike, things are going to get really bad in Canada.
When I first read this article, I figured I may actually see one of those rare Hunter Harrison comments that I actually agree with him on. While that’s mostly true, he said a key point that I strongly disagree with. Canada’s rail network is nowhere near the best in the world. The railways have abandoned and failed to maintain numerous key routes (CP’s Ottawa Valley Railway between Montreal & Western Canada, all trains must be routed ~170 miles longer via Toronto; CN Drumheller Sub between Saskatoon & Calgary, CN now routes their trains via Edmonton; thousands upon thousands of miles of former CP & CN branchlines that have been abandoned; additional thousands upon thousands of miles of branchlines that have not been maintained AT ALL in years; and many more, check out the old rail maps of Canada or even Trains Magazine’s “Canadian Wheat Branches” map), the mileage of routes abandoned or simply not maintained is astronomical. However, I feel the government stepping in and doing this will achieve nothing. Grain will move the same pace it is now, the only difference will be that now CP & CN are being fined for things beyond their control. Everything else will remain the same. If the government really cared about this, Transport Canada (STB equivalent) wouldn’t have allowed so many lines to be abandoned in the first place. This legislation will achieve nothing.
This is nothing more than a simplistic feel-good approach to appease farmers who over-produced without having a clue as to the problems that would cause. Maybe the solution is for Canadian prairie taxpayers to foot the bill for constructing multiple-track main lines and for buying and maintaining thousands of cars and hundreds of locomotives that could be held in a state of constant readiness for a once-in-a-decade or longer record harvest. Puhleeze!
(cont) of said profession, having lost the long term feeling. The CPR charter of the 1870’s carries significant responsibility in return for the significant cash and land grants provided by the people of Canada. It is significant that Canada is not the Excited States of America. Our Western prairies rely directly on these railways to be service providers, not antagonists. Time will decide if the present American railway leadership served well. HH certainly has his money in the bank, while at the moment many farmers have $0 in the bank from this year’s crop. t
Our American friends are very quick to speak expertise about this situation. This is a complex situation that directly affects every Western Canadian grain grower. Understood that grain rates are not market driven(a former CP president traded low grain rates for govt $ to create the southern BC route, subsequently given reprieve in the last 20 years), however the absolute arrogance and disdain which the railways are treating grain shippers is the basis for some action. Funny how Hunter is remiss in addressing his efforts this past year to improve the bottom line(ie share holder $) by parking power and furloughing crews in western Canada. His friend Mr Ackman who professed his desire to be a long term share holder, promptly sold half his interest within one year of said profession. g
Sounds like the Canadian government wants to go back into the freight railroad business. Feel sorry for any CP/CN investors. Looks like investing in a Canadian railroad is a pretty risky proposition, since if you don’t or can’t physically do what the government wants, they’ll fine you–perhaps into bankruptcy. CP/CN are probably too big to fail for Canada so they’d probably end up bailing them out anyway. I’m sure CP/CN cut capacity to cut costs to improve their return on investment–if any. If those lines were viable, short line operators would have purchased them–but perhaps these short line operators were leery of what the Canadian government would do–and it turns out for good reason. Does the Canadian grain CN/CP moves through their lines in the US count towards the total? What about the grain that originates in the US but moves by rail through Canada? Will US grain movements on CN/CP be delayed since the Canadian grain movements will probably get priority over US grain due to potential fines by the Canadian government?