There’s a long BNSF grain train tied up here in town. It rolled in this morning, behind 3 big, 6-axle locomotives, including a really dirty, faded warbonnet, #742, on the point. About once or twice a month, a train will lay over here in town. In a situation like this, what happens after the crew ties the train down for the night?
Hopefully, they’ll find a place to eat and then a motel room for overnight. If not, they’ll have a long taxi ride to their home terminal.
How do you think it works, in a yard that’s typically not someone’s away yard? Think the yardmaster has the crew picked up in a stretch limo, to take them to a 5 star restaurant before retireing at the Marriot?
Actually, the company jet is waiting at Foss Field to take them back to their home terminal.
NOT!
If they tied up on their hours of service, most likely they were picked up by a taxi, taken to the cheapest roach motel BNSF has a contract with, and put off on their rest time.
You said this happens about once a month, right?
Depending on how far away their home terminal is, or the next terminal up the line, they will be cabbed there after their rest time, to either start over or return a train back.
Dinner will be what ever the local scene has, most likely Mickey Dees…and if they are cabbed back to the home terminal, it is with a contract service, probably in a really dirty three row seating van, with cruddy tires, no A/C, driven by a low functioning, illiterate minimum wager barely awake themselves.
I stayed once in a fairly clean AmericInn once, where a CP train crew was put up for the night. I shudder to think how low one could go on the roach hotel chart![xx(]
Is the meal away, usually on a per diem amount?
if we’re lucky enough to be put up in a motel within walking distance to a food joint, we usually don’t go by ourselves because of the location. seems like we always stay in a rough section. what the others said is right, could be any number of things causing a train to sit for long periods of time. the general public thinks we ‘‘park’’ our trains and sleep and drink liquor and get paid millions of dollars for doing nothing.
What happens to the crew depends on what local agreements might provide for, and what type of crew is on the train. A crew made up of people called off the extra board for short turn service, as opposed to filling a vacancy on a pool turn, would cab back to their home terminal. A pool crew in thru freight service would most likely cab on to their destination, home or away from home, the same as if they continued on the train. There are a couple of terminals on the UP that the pool crews based there just spot or pull elevators in Northwest Iowa. Those crews always return home, as there is no away from home terminal in those cases.
An example of this: We handle coal trains to the power plant at Marshalltown, Iowa. It’s about 55 miles from Boone, the home terminal for road crews. If a crew is called off the extra board for a short turn, they will take the train to Marshalltown and spot the plant. They may leave the engines there or bring them back to Boone. If they leave the engines there, they will cab back to Boone.
If a crew is called off the thru freight pool, they too may return home or go on to Clinton, the away from home terminal. It’s at the descretion of the railroad. If there are too many crews away from home, they probably will go back home to Boone. Short on crews, and they go on to Clinton.
A pool crew leaving the away from home terminal that yards or ties down a train at an intermediate point usually cabs on home. However, this too is at the railroad’s descretion. We can be returned to the away from home terminal once. This is where local agreements can come into play. If they return us to the away from home terminal, we go first out on the board and as soon as we are rested, we will get called to work home. If for some reason we have to tie down short of the home terminal again
Embassy Suites
Thanks Jeff! That was interesting. Just how far will the railroad cab a crew home?
Not to be facetious, but they’ll cab a crew as far as necessary. Often times at Fremont I’ll hear the TS (transportation supervisor) tell a crew that when they are finished doing whatever they are doing, there will be a van (wagon to the NP crews) to take them to North Platte. That’s around 240 miles from Fremont.
There is a new interdivisional agreement that could have a Boone, IA based North Pool crew take a train to South St. Paul, MN and tie up. Go on duty there and take a train to one of any points covered in this new agreement, say Sioux City, IA. Upon finishing the second trip, the crew must be cabbed to their home terminal, in this example Boone.
Clinton-Missouri Valley Long Pool crews quite often get relieved at Boone and continue by van to either end depending on which way they were headed. (Secret, since Boone is a crew change point, any long pool train that may not be able to make the entire trip can be recrewed without it counting as a recrew enroute in their statistics.)
Jeff