Is there any businesses that have 1 or 2 sidings that get in loaded wellcars and TOFC?
In Jefferson, Iowa there is a company that makes some kind of soy product for export to Japan. This is shipped out in containers. The containers come in empty on flat cars or spine cars, I can’t recall any double stack well cars. They have their own container lift vehicle. They unload the container from the car, load the product into the container and reload the container onto the car.
Jeff
Ashley furniture in Arcadia Wis. loads TOFC cars at thier facility
That company wouldn’t be called Microsoy would it?
No that’s a company out of Redding, Washington that makes a vegetarian alternative to Windows XP…[xx(]
Yup,
Thats them.
It is kinda bland, and dosnt work too well, but if you cover it with mayo, and serve it on rye, it aint too bad!
Ed[:D]
If it performs an illegal operation, it might shut down too.[:D]
Is that anything like Soylent Green?
Its people dont eat It!
This would make sence at Wal- Mart distrubution centers that handles hundreds of truck each day. Conrail used to have small staitions with circus style loading. Vermont Railways has piggyback ramps at Rutland and Burlington but i have yet to see a Vermont Railway trailer on Vermont Railway in Vermont.
Last week, I saw them loading containers in the Green River yard, took em aobut a half hour to load 2 containers on 1 car, and they had about 15-20 cars there, I wonder if they are done yet 
For some reason, when reading this thread I got this window…
[:D][:D][bow]
… and isn’t it interesting that in his error window, both choices are grayed out, meaning unavailable as platform choices…
dharmon- seriously, I am not worthy of your ‘I am not worthy’ smileys!
(I like 'em, though!)
I should be bowin’ to you. … I’m just a trouble maker[:D][bow][bow][bow]
OK overmod…
Well that didn’t turn out well- try this one…
… With, of course, the same box popping up with the OTHER “Click Me!” highlighted whenever you press one…
Keeps blonde VB programmers entertained for hours and hours… ;-}
There are some applications where a mini ramp might make sense, but there is a challenge for the RRs.
Lets say that the customer is a receiver of goods, like a WalMart Distrubution Center. Those hundreds of trailers are coming from hundreds of places. At some point or possibly at multiple points, the RR would have to consolidate these many trailers coming from many locations, into one train to get to the customer’s ramp.
This get more complicated with the 3 pack or 5 pack cars used these days. If the RR has a 5 pack of car of trailers but only 3 are destined to the customer ramp and two are not, they have to do some rework. Then, once they get the train all sorted out and consolidated, they need a switch job or local job to get it to the customer. The delays and rework from all this would likely mean that it would be higher cost and slower than just using a rail ramp in the region.
The alternative is the customer that ships outbound. You have the same problem in reverse. Can they load a 3-5 pack car / cars / train all for the same destination? If not, again the RR has to take it somewhere, rework it and add parts to trains going to the respective locations = cost and delays.
If a shipper / recvr could initiate or receive a substantial block or full train which goes point to point (all same orgin and destination), then you might be able to make it work (basic units train.) But then you’ve got to have the volume to justify the lift equipment and you’re going to have to pay car-hire on the flats or well cars while they sit on your siding. Car hire on some all purpose well cars runs $100 per day. There again, eating up the saving. Tough issues.
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You can put them anywhere where you are willing to pay for the mechanical inspection after loading. This is the main reason why you do not see this outside of dedicated publicCOFC/TOFC facilities anymore. (ie-you have to have the volume to pay for the mechanical inspection, the railroads don’t tend to donate the manhours)