Railroad also kills Howard Street Tunnel clearance project in Baltimore
http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2017/11/02-csx-intermodal-cuts
Chess would be a lot easier to play if there weren’t as many pieces on the board. That seems to be EHH’s philosophy for the railroad…
I’m an outsider however even I can see that the BOD is going to have cause to remove EHH pretty soon for cause. The reason failure to improve the shareholder value. CSX IM customers are going to royally pissed off and I can think of 3 that used the North Baltimore in Ohio for a hub for their Operations. Fed Ex Schiender and JB Hunt all had massive terminals in that area. Guess what you happens when you make them mad they just might jerk their stuff back off the rails. Now we have the crap in Baltimore with the Howard Street Tunnel. This guy is either brain damaged or incompetent to run a company. I frankly would not trust him to even be a janitor at my bosses company.
As you know, I’m from out of town as it were, so forgive me if I don’t get the terminology right.
Does EHH think he can earn more from intermodal by hauling international containers that were offloaded on the west coast, and turned over to CSX by the western carriers for forwarding to eastern US markets, than by hauling these same containers from the Port of Baltimore to their destinations in the east.
Is this a manifestation of a low opinion he may hold about the “new & improved” Panama Canal?
I have no answers, just curiosity.
Bruce
How many containers from the Port of Baltimore will CSX haul to, maybe, Chicago or St. Louis or Memphis at the farthest - basically the upper Midwest.
Is there enough volume going there? Can’t CSX already reach those same destinations from the deepwater container ports at Portsmouth VA, or Charleston or Savannah or Jacksonville or Tampa?
They are not going to haul containers by doublestack from Baltimore to Philadelphia or New York or Charlotte or Atlanta or Florida or New Orleans.
And how much volume is there from Florida or Georgia to New Jersey that would require doublestacking?
I am guessing he looked at the volumes and figured 1/3 of a $450 million project is too much capital that could be better deployed on extended sidings elsewhere.
If the project is going to get done, it will likely end up being with a token amount of CSX money - maybe 5% - and the rest funded by the State of Maryland, the City of Baltimore, and the United States government.
Just my humble opinion.
Corrected it for you!
Concern for the good of the industry: Is there any way NS csn serve the Port of Baltimore and make CSX’s departure from the scene irrelavent?
NS has the restrictions of operating under Amtrak catenary and also cannot operate Double stacks. For NS to go West from the Port of Baltimore, they have to operate on Amtrak to Perryville and then the Port Road from Perryville to Harrisburg.
But if CSX doesn’t raise clearances in the Baltimore tunnel, then they are just as restricted as NS is. And if NS is a more service-minded demand-responsive operation, cannot they get some of the business that would otherwise have gone to CSX, maybe being demand-responsive enough to make the port competitive?
And if IC and South Shore can have catenary that clears double-stacks, why not Amtrak on both the NEC and Keystone? Might doing this cost less than the changes to the Howard Street Tunnel?
Amtrak doesn’t want volume freight operations on the NEC - they suffer what freight operations that still exist on the NEC grudgingly and would prefer such operations just vaporize and go away. I don’t know what limitations Amtrak has place on NS freight operations from Baltimore to Perryville and the Port Road - I suspect they are rather severe.
The Port of Baltimore was the reason for the formation of the B&O - Baltimore has been a port city since the city was formed. The Port of Baltimore is probably the largest single economic engine in Baltimore and the State of Maryland. While containers are not the only commodity that the port handles, it is the current growth commodity of ocean transportation.
NS going north from the port on the NEC to Perryville and the Port Deposit line would avoid the tunnels. On a Trainorders thread it was said that NS tried to negotiate for access there on one track. ATK wants to add more tracks there, including the bridges. With every Maryland Congressman and both Senators pushing for Baltimore Port access, maybe ATK will listen. The thread also says that CSX operated double stacks under SEPTA ex-Reading wires.
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?4,2661222
On IC, I thought the freights had separate tracks from the electrified suburban service
Yes, the IC Electric had its own tracks–and this operation continues under Metra.
I suspect SEPTA was receptive to CSX’s proposition about operating double stacks over a portion of their system. I also suspect Amtrak has been very antagonistic to the same proposition from NS.
As was already said, the IC electric passenger operation, and the South Shore trackage rights on it, were built and operated as seperate from the freight lines. They had their own tracks which were not, and are not, used by freight trains.
AFAIK, double stacks don’t operate north of the CN’s (old IC) Chicago intermodal terminal just north of I-294. This is where the old IC Markham hump yard was.
If CSX were serious about developing the I-95 corridor for domestic boxes, they need a new Howard St. Tunnel.
So, the simple conclusion is that CSX isn’t that interested in the I-95 corridor. The NS routes to I-95 locations to/from NY-NJ is considerably longer and slower.
Yes, but it does provide the service.
Once CSX gets to the Philadelphia area, it looks like all bets are off for doublestack service if you are thinking of Florida to New Jersey service.
https://www.csx.com/index.cfm/customers/value-added-services/dimensional-clearance/clearance-maps/
CSX does utilize a route via SEPTA and NYSW to move double stacks to the New York area. When I was working the trains were identified as Q190 & Q191. They were Philadelphia-Jersey trains and not operated as a part of the I-95 corridor fleet of trains.
Yes that route to the waterfront is clear on the map if you zoom in close enough.
It looks like the whole south side of the Philly area is all “red zone” for doublestacks.