Yes.
Yes, It helped to be in Tom DeLay’s district.
Yes, have a logistics manager such as UPS negotiate your rates for you as a package deal with their other clients.
Okay, from another thread, I have another viewpoint on the goal behind open access:
On the other hand, I don’t even consider separation of infrastructure and train running to be necessary. As near as I can tell, it would only be “the whole point” if the goal is to reregulate the railroads, but limit that regulation to the part that is a “monopoly”.
P.S. Sometimes I see open access abbreviated as OA, but sometimes I also see the abbreviation OE in contexts that appear as though it means open access. What does OE stand for?
Nice try at spin, Poindexter. “Forced to use” as I said and stand by, is not even close to being the same as “forced to think” which you have subsequently attributed to me. Like I’ve said before, once the antagonists of industrial evolution start spinning and throwing out such dracocian Big Brother spectors, they have all but admitted that they have lost the argument.
If an academic recieves federal money for his/her work, or is submitting research opinion as fodder for influencing public policy, said academics should be responsible enough not to omit reference works which are major variables in the subsequent discussion. When they do, they should be forced to return any taxpayer funds used to support their research, and should be subsequently disqualified from making public policy suggestions. <
Yes, the second rail carrier will increase cost. At a minimum you’ll be using two crews to do what one crew does very well now. And you’ll double the train frequency needed to handle the same traffic.
And yes, you could put a “3rd Party contractor” in there to do the switching. But then you’d have three crews doing the work now done by one crew. Open access will increase the cost of providing rail service. There is no doubt about it.
That’s why railroads are “Natural Monopolies”. Now try to understand that that doesn’t mean that there is no competition - there is. But that competition comes from trucks, barges, etc. Not from putting multiple railroads in service on a line.
Datafever: I learned a lot from all the discussion of open access. For better or worse, here is my take on the subject: Open access is really just a way for some shippers to lower their shipping costs, by forcing their railroad connection to lower their profits on the shipments. Most of the complaints from the shippers come off like little kids, whining “it’s not fair”, because someone else got a bigger piece of pie. I always respond to my kids, when they say that, that life isn’t fair. The railroads, on the other hand, charge what they charge, simply because they can. They are in it to make a profit, and their stockholders wouldn’t have it any other way. To seperate the railroads from the infrastructure is social engineering, redistributing the wealth, and punishing the railroads for making a profit. These 3 goals seems almost “Anti-American”. Especially, when you admit that the only group that can raise the funds to buy out the infrastructure would be Uncle Sam-a prospect that I doubt would ever get through Congress.
Are some suppliers getting jabbed? Probably. Are some railroads making some big bucks off certain shippers? Certainly. Is open access the cure-all for this? No. It almost appears that pushing for the most extremefix (open access) is thought to be a way to bring the railroads to some sort agreement to lower some rates. I doubt it. At this point, it would seem that the most likely improvement would come from the threat of re-regulation of some type, forcing the railroads to play by the rules of the already existing rate laws.
( You may fire when you ready Mr. futuremodal[(-D])
I would more or less agree with your statement, but I would also like to clarify something - separation of infrastructure from operations is only one of many open access proposals that have been put forth. In most proposals, this is not an issue at all.
I suspect that what most people on this forum object to isn’t open access per se, but the particular implementation that requires infrastructure separation (and regulation). I dare say that there are some people who are completely unaware that most open access proposals do not require infrastructure separation. The only reason that I say this is that I have never seen any other open access implementations discussed on this forum.
Would you feel better about supporting an open access proposal that did not require infrastructure separation, nor reduce the ability of railroads to make profits?
Hmmm…I’ve never really heard of an open access scenario that doesn’t involve seperation. Tell me more, please.
Why does that not surprise me? Ah, well…
Are you familiar with how interchange works? I don’t. But I do know that it is a mechanism by which freight that originates with one railroad ends up being shipped over another railroad. A shipper connected to railroad A can ship product to a receiver connected to railroad B. Railroads A and B (and any connecting railroads) must have a mechanism in place that would allow this to happen. One proposal (as I see it) kind of expands on this. It would allow the shipper to negotiate a shipping price with railroad B (instead of railroad A which it is directly connected to). Railroad B pays railroad A for switching fees and standard interchange. But this increases competition because now the shipper can negotiate with either railroad in order to achieve the best possible rate.
If I understand railroad operations correctly, railroad territories are broken into trackage areas called terminals or terminal areas. A terminal area could have only one shipper, or it could have quite few. Some shortline railroads handle only one terminal area, which connects to another railroad’s mainline. Other railroads have many terminal areas, which connect to their own mainline. There are various proposals that would require railroad A to allow railroad B to provide terminal service or switching service. What I don’t really understand about these proposals is th
I must not be following this correctly. Suppose a Montana wheat shipper doesn’t like the rates that BNSF is offering. He could then get a better rate from UP? Only problem is, UP has to pay BNSF for use of the track(?) I can’t picture BNSF giving UP any kind of a bargain rate price. Therefore, UP won’t be abale to price any less than BNSF. If BNSF is forced to give UP a sweetheart price, that isn’t open access. It’s simply re-regulation. As it stands now, there’s probably nothin
[quote user=“Murphy Siding”]
I must not be following this correctly. Suppose a Montana wheat shipper doesn’t like the rates that BNSF is offering. He could then get a better rate from UP? Only problem is, UP has to pay BNSF for use of the track(?) I can’t picture BNSF giving UP any kind of a bargain rate price. Therefore, UP won’t be abale to price any less than BNSF. If BNSF is forced to give UP a sweetheart price, that isn’t open access. It’s simply re-regulat
The problem with “rate laws” is that no one on this planet can possibly know what the rate should be. Should the BNSF charge $3,000 to move 100 tons of wheat from Great Falls, MT to Portland, OR - or should it only charge $2,000? There is literally No Way On Earth to know.
The Montana farmers and their politicians obviously want lower charges. They want the BNSF forced by Federal Government action to haul the grain at a lower rate. I obviously disagree with this. I don’t believe the farmers have a “claim” on the railroad. I don’t believe it is obligated to haul their grain at all, let alone at a price it doesn’t freely agree to.
“Open Access” is not an answer because it will drive railroad cost up. This will benifit no one. The railroads operate in a competitive environment now. The competition may come from trucks and barges instead of another railroad, but the competition is there. (This does include that Montana wheat, which can easily move truck/barge to the export terminal in Portland, OR)
This very real competitive environment is why real rates steadily went down following productivity improvements from the time of deregulation until the capacity crunch.
The dang government just needs to stay out of it. Let competition control the
Is it open access that you are against? Or is it specific implementations of open access that you are against? In other words, if open access could be implemented in such a way that the railroads were not economically disadvantaged (or even gained), would you support that?
You’re going to have to be more specific. I haven’t seen one thing that indicates there would be any overall net benifit from any form of OA, or from any increased government regulation of freight rates. They’re both simply a a way to make the governement play Robin Hood and force a transfer of money from people who have invested in railroads to people who have invested in other things. (Such as farmland.)
From any form of OA? But railroads already engage in limited forms of OA. Trackage rights, haulage rights, and reciprocal switching rights are all forms of voluntary open access that railroads negotiate with each other for various reasons with no government regulation involved. I highly suspect that they engage in these transactions because it economically advantages them to do so.
So would you support an implementation of open access that was not economically disadvantageous to the railroads?
I don’t see trackage rights or recipricol switching as a form of Open Access.
If one railroad has excess capacity on a line, it may freely choose to sell that capacity to another railroad. I recently watched a UP intermodal roll through Downers Grove, IL on the BNSF. No problem. The BNSF has the capacity, UP needs it, they worked out a deal. (actually, SP worked out the deal, UP inherited it.)
But that doesn’t mean the UP can run a local and spot cars of flour and sugar at the Peperige Farm plant in Downers Grove. That’s not part of the agreement. Having two locals from two different railroads would drive up the cost.
Same with recipricol switching. One railroad serves the facility, not two or more. You send one crew in to do the job. That’s all you need. Any more than that and you’re wasting money.
Okay, fair enough. Maybe instead of using the phrase “limited open access”, I could call it “limited access”. After all, as you point out, the access is not for just anyone, but only for the parties involved in the agreement.
I guess what I was trying to get at is that there are cases where the railroads already agree to let certain other railroads operate (in certain specified ways) on their tracks. I posit that they enter into these agreements because the find it
Well, actually, there is. It’s called the free market. It’s just that those on receiving end of free market prices don’t always see it that way.[;)]
I’d be all for that. I’d also be all for beer that “tastes great/is less filling”, money that grows on trees, and weight loss programs that let me “eat anything, and not have to execise”. I just don’t see any of this happening. Railroads would be willing to (and do ) allow “access” over some lines, if they could make more money than doing it themselves.
The fact that they don’t do it on a more wide-spread basis, leads me to believe it’s not in their favor, monetarily.
I don’t disagree with what you are saying. If there was an implementation of open access that was obviously going to make the railroads richer, I think that we can safely assume that they railroads would have already implemented it.
But this can also be looked at from different perspectives. You have already pointed out that if regulation is not involved, then railroads will just set rates sufficiently high to offset any potential loss of revenue. Would you not agree that any implementation of open access that does not involve regulation of rates (or other aspects of operation) does not cause economic disadvantages to the railroads? In other words, if the railroads can set their own rates (whether the infrastructure is separated or not is quite irrelevant), then full and complete open access will not pose a financial burden on any railroad.
So, why haven’t they implemented open access all by themselves? Why are they waiting for congress to eventually pass a regulated form of open access? I would suggest that at least part of the reason is inertia. “We’ve always done it this way.” Businesses and industries are highly resistant to change (note: yes, this is a way too general statement. There are businesses and industries that adapt quite readily to change - or at least the types of changes t
You are assuming that competing rail companies will not be able to maximize labor and capital productivity. Faulty assumption. Again, look at all the currrent multiple use, trackage rights, et al agreements - these are not increasing costs, they are actually lowering costs.
You’re stuck on faulty. Why would a 3rd party need three crews? You really aren’t thinking this through.
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That’s why railroads are “Natural Monopolies”. Now try to understand that that doesn’t mean that there is no competition - there is. But that competition comes from trucks, barges, etc. Not f