OMAHA, Neb. – Union Pacific’s embrace of Precision Scheduled Railroading principles came just two months after Wall Street analysts peppered CEO Lance Fritz with questions about why his railroad couldn’t be more like CSX Transportat…
At my last review, my supervisor told me we were going to a new plan similar to PSR, but not exactly the same and they weren’t calling it PSR. (Although I did see PSR mentioned in a message to employees.) I was told that some trains might become smaller and more frequent. That they didn’t want to hold trains to maximum tonnage at the expense of service. Other local officials have told others about the same. That more engines and crews would be needed. Leading some of the latest batch of new hires I’ve worked with hoping this will keep them from getting furloughed.
I guess we shall see how it comes out. Whether we fit the customers to the plan or fit the plan to the customers.
Jeff
For UP, this is going back to some basics. If I remember correctly, when we (C&NW) were merged into UP, they had a system (inherited from MP) that made individual plans for each car, and could theoretically tell their customers when their car would arrive, on what train, etc. Then the railroad melted down with CNW, kind of recovered, then went completely down the tubes when the SP rail network was absorbed.
If they’re talking about shorter, more frequent trains, that’s great. What I don’t get is why they’re purging their roster of units of any size. They may need them! I’m not at all sure what the current status for stored locomotives might be, but those low-horsepower units might be the ones to store, at least until things work out.
In other news, UNP shares jumped nearly seven bucks today on this news. My own preduction is that these seven bucks will slowly disappear again. But the shareholders apparently see this as being good for them because they want to lower the operating ratio. They got theirs…now let’s see whether customers and employees get theirs as well. (Someone recently said that when stock goes up, executive pay goes up…when stocks go back down, employees are laid off.) I hope it stays up, if for no other reason than that the lion’s share of my 401K is fueled by UP stock.
CSX took the precision out of Scheduled Railroading.
I was talking to a CSX conductor last night at the tail end of his train. They’d just made a pickup or drop (I forget which) and were getting back out on the main.
He told me that someone had decided that said moves would now be made at the end of the train, instead of right behind the power. Which now meant that the conductor had to make his way over 70 cars back to his power. Not bad last night, might be a little dicey with a foot of snow on the ground…
Meanwhile, a main is tied up just that much longer.
Back in the day - Chessie System had one train that made scheduled rear end set offs. Train 396 - Originated from Saginaw, MI with Auto Parts, working it’s way to Walbridge. From Walbridge the train carried two blocks, the head end had Wilmington auto parts, the rear end Baltimore auto parts, with a caboose separating the blocks.
Train operated to Bayview Yard in Baltimore. Upon stopping for a crew change, a Bayview yard job operated out on #1 Main and made a cut behind the caboose. With the crew changed and the cut made, the balance of the train proceeded to Wilmington with the cars for GM’s BOP Plant at Wilmington. The Bayview yard job after having made the cut and watched the head end of 396 depart, then crossed over at the interlocking at Bayview and then coupled up to the set off and took it down the Sparrows Point branch toward GM’s Baltimore Assembly plant.
396 is no more as GM no longer has assembly plants at Baltimore or Wilmington.
THAT sounds like a decision made by a bunch of no-railroad-experience-semi-drunk corporate yes-men at a 3-martini lunch.
I wonder how that will work if CSX is still running their 200-car monster trains, and/or in -10 degree weather. Walk back 150 cars, make the move, walk further back (or pull by) for the air test, then walk up those same 200 cars.
Let’s hear it for overtime!
Nope. Not allowed overtime.
Larry, the account of dropping the rear car off reminds me of the story of the newly hired salaried man who had noticed the short lengths of rail with bent ends here and there around switches and were nver touched by the wheels of trains or cuts. He suggested that they be taken up, straightened, and used where they were needed. He was politely told that they where they were needed.
However, it may be a bit more difficult to tell whoever directed that switching that the car(s) to be be dropped off ahould be right behind the engine. Perhaps such a person should be invited to make a road trip in the winter and walk with the conductor?
Sounds like an order to try to pre-block the trains. It’s all the rage now.
The mileage componet of todays runs in many cases prevents Overtime starting until the crew has exceeded their Hours of Service time.
I dare you to find that purported decision maker on any Class 1 railroad in the past 30 years.
Talk about oudated stereotypes,
True. Most of them drink Monster drinks now.
And where is the rest of the story? (like pruning the system of lower performing lines? Heard that yesterday and today as well here in Chicago (plus Tony Hatch this morning, earlier than scheduled) )
Red Bull & Vodka
Based on the webcast this morning, I wouldn’t hold my breath. Everything boiled down to longer trains with less HP per ton, less locomotives, less T&E personnel, less managers, and more road trains stopping to block swap.
The only discernible rays of sunlight were Lance Fritz’s commitments to keep service levels high for premium intermodal and to not shut down any hump yards. The Wall Street people on the call were noticeably underwhelmed that the OR guidance wasn’t revised downward. Mr. Fritz might be looking for another job soon. Record quarters aren’t enough. Your railroad has to be the anorexic OR queen of the block to get any props from Wall Street these days. The financial people still don’t understand that CP and CSX were just short-term hatchet jobs.
Wall Street is building itself up for another 2007-2008 crash. Wall Steet’s visions of the business cycle have become shorter term as the
There was a rumor floating around a while back that Fritz was thinking about running for office. I don’t know if it was supposed to be for the state or federal level.
We’ve been doing rear end setouts and pickups at terminals (where usually there is a van and utility man to help) for sometime. They started it after a couple of fatalities happened where the person riding the shove was knocked off. (It also led to rules restricting when one could ride a shove and a litany of things to discuss during the job briefing.) It’s kind of a pain when it’s a small block of cars, but a lot better when trying to setout 7 or 8 K feet of cars. Just pull through a yard track and double or triple over what doesn’t fit. (If there’s no clear rail to pull through, then you’re right back to square one on handling large amounts of cars while shoving. Then you are handling the through train plus the setout.)
Speaking of cost cutting. Last night I went to work at 1240am. I noticed in our bulletins a crossing protection order issued about 940pm, 3 hours earlier. It was only on one track in two main track territory, the other track wasn’t affected. We got to the last control point before the crossing about 7am and were held. They were single tracking on the good track around the crossing. Heard over the radio that there was an impassable broken rail. The break was in the crossing circuit and that’s why protection had been disabled only on one of the tracks, hence the crossing order. Instead of fixing the broken rail once it was found, they decided to just wait until the section gang started their regular work day the next morning, avoiding overtime. That’s the first time I’ve ever seen that happen on the main track. G-55 in action. (I told the conductor that the real reason was that they were out of replacement rails and the store wouldn’t open until morning. I forge
Be glad it’s not where a certain carrier gets their equipment: Rail-Mart, where the product is made in China with prison labor and all the specs are fudged.