The quick "buck"

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

I was driving last night around the relatively new local GM plant, where they assemble the silverado. The plant was built new during my 20 years out of the area, and I couldn’t help but to notice all of the RR infastructure built to accomodate this plant.

Now I know that customarily, a private facility will have to pay a railroad a token sum for a spur in to their facility, then get nickled and dimed in perpetuity for “switch maintenance” fees and the like,…but, we are talking one whopping installation here, with what seems like a classification yard all in it’s own adjacent to this plant. My suspicion is that this could not possibly all be at the expense of the customer, there simply is too much of it.

In this time where the impetus seems to be one of ripping up and salvaging the rails whereever possible, clearly the RR’s have the money to build where there is promise of a quick buck in return.

2

I’d be interested in knowing who footed the bill for the yard…

Like they say though, if it will generate enough money for the railroad then they’ll build it, just like all the RR tracks that run into the powder river basin.

3

Hire rd is a yard here in Defiance. it has alot of cars for gm.Gm also has a yard inside the plant facility have seen the engines but not the yard itself.AG have you been off of county rd 57 in dekalb county.that yard ns has for hiedman steel is nice.
stay safe
Joe

4

You might check with the plants management, the yard just might belong to GM.
Lots of plant and industries own and maintain their own yards and inter plant rails, along with having their own switch crews.
Makes it easier on the plant, cheaper in the long run.

Then again, the railroad may have a deal with the plant, and use the yard for storage and pick up.
Makes more sense to have the racks on hand, on location, than having to drag them out there, set them up, then return later to pick up the loads.

This way, when the plant needs 10 racks to load up, they dont have to wait for the railroad to bring them out there, all they have to do is have their switch crew reach over and grab what they need, shove them in the plant, then spot them for pick up by the local.

No special switch move charges, either.

We have somewhat the same set up with the plastic plants down here.

We built what we refer to as the Marshalling yard, somewhat centrally located near several plastic plants, Dow, Solvay, Phillips and Fina.

They rent track space from us, use it for SIT, and we store empties there too, in case we need extras to fill out the odd car order.

Every body wins.

We dont choke our switching yards holding covered hoppers and tanks, they get to store their lease cars, and if they need 50 extra hoppers, we dont have to scramble around, trying to find them, they are already out there, next door to the plants.

Ed

5

I would imagine many different arrangements can be made, but in the “cash short” times, the ICG would install the siding and related facilities, with cash fronted by the industry. The railroad would then pay the shipper a fixed dollar amount per car shipped off the facility. This could probably be considered a rather convoluted loan arrangement, but it gave the railroad the security that the shipper would use the siding and rail service, and it gave the shipper an incentive to ship cars.

Jay

6

NO, but now that you let me know it’s there, I’ll have to go have a look [:D]

7

Hard to say with any certainty, …I went out for a more indepth look today, and my guess is “marraige of conveniance”. Clearly the new GM plant put a pocket of demand where previously was only farmers fields, but at the same time what used to be a lonely single track between Ft Wayne and Roanoke, now has two lengthy by-pass sidings, making for conveniant turn over of “meets”, then most of th

8

Is one of the sideings near this new yard?
Bet on the plant having it’s own switcher, and they set out the loaded racks for pick up in that sideing.
Lubrizoil petrochemicals do this, they have a mini yard in their plant, we run by, drop off their order, and pick up what ever they set out in the sideing.
Saves them interplant switching fees, saves us time.

By the way, is the now non busy main, is it directional running now, all one way in the morning, other way in the evening?

Ed

9

Triple crown runs both ways, the mixed freights seem to be mostly west bound AM and east bound PM, though that is based upon 2 month old observations, anymore I just hear the cluster of activity around 11 Am, 4 PM, and 10 ish at night. Same line passes near my house after joining/crossing the newcastle sub

With a grade crossing across the river, I tend to draw assumptions, based upon where I hear the first whistle if on the other side, good chance it’s eastbound, if on this side, good chance it’s west bound.

What i don’t know, sight unseen, is how many of those are just ‘pick ups’ out at the factory

10

A lot of facilities for major industries (i.e. auto plants, steel mills etc) are funded as part of a deal when the plant is sited and often includes a significant amount of tax dollars or tax breaks from local and state agencies combined with some investment from the railroad(s) involved and the company owning the plant. Maitenance then is done by the company and/or the railroad by agreement.

LC

11

The reasoning behind the directional question was based on what UP, BNSF and KSC did here, in Houston.

I live a block away from the the old CB&Q-Rock Island line to Dallas/Fort Worth, now a BNSF main.

Ten years ago, BN ran trains almost every hour, both ways.

There were passing sideings everywhere, and you could count on at least on train every hour.

After the UP/SP merger meltdown, the big three got a brain storm, and formed the Joint Dispatching center, in Spring, a small town just outside Houston.

TD1(train dispatcher one) TD2 and TD3 all work in the same building, all with the same screens, so now, instead of three different diaspatchers in three different locations, all trying to dispatch trains on lines they had never even seen, you have them all in the same place, each one dispatching each others trains in their respective sections.

And they are required to go out and ride the lines they dispatch, once a year, so they know the actual geography of the track they dispatch.

TD1 handles all inbound trains entering the metro complex, TD2 dispatches all outbounds, and TD3 handles all internal dispatching inside the complex.

Each railroad provided the resorces and personel, and the Joint Center
plays no favorites with any one railroads trains.

TD1 has to be able to talk to, and see what TD3 is doing, so he knows if there is a hole he can use to bring a train into the complex.
TD3 has to be able to do the same with TD2, so she knows if she can turn lose a bunch of outbounds from the yards out onto the mains, or if she can use a main for a yard to yard transfer, and TD2 has to know who, what, and where the outbounds TD3 lets lose are going, to make sure he has the space to run them.

You can hear a UP dispatcher raising cain with a KCS crew, for blocking a BN train!

They decided on directional running from the beginning, almost all inbound traffic enters the comp

12

The auto plant ownes the yard facilities and maintance. we provide the switching ( around here with gm anyways) and it works out fine its a hourly agreement from what i gather. and just like ed said when they want something they have a hotline to the operators or trainmaster and ask for it and what they want the company does flips to provide it. even if its breaking rules. trainmasters have had crews break rules to provide fast service to the customers. when they are paying for 2-4 differant switchers at a time to do the jobs crews- engines - and a good rate the company demands you service them. but if they aint demanding anything do not break rules on your own it gets you fired.

13

I’ll have to take a closer look. It seemed like last year when the frequency was way up, they were on a definite drive to shorter trains.

This year its been less motivating to walk the 3/4 mile to see 4 trains over one hour if everything goes well, more commonly watching one train wait forever while an on coming clears the bottleneck where the track was still single line, but as you mention, they MAY be bigger. Hav’ta look

14

NS provides all the inplant switching at the FWA Assembly Plant. At least 2 sometimes 3 locals stop and go up the hill to the plant. L90 seems to just go back and forth between East Wayne Yard and GM. Also several through trains stop and drop-off / pick-up blocks of cars as well. You’re right, it does come in waves, as you can see four trains in Roanoke siding at a time, waiting on their turn or opposing traffic.

15

Hey matt and I could come over and look with you too[:)]
stay safe
joe

16

I probably SHOULD get to know you Joe, you seem a lot like me in many ways[:)]

Trouble is, now that I’m retired, it’s hard for me to keep even a semblance of a schedule, I think it’s “fallout” from my having had every moment spoken for all those years of working, more to do in each days time than can possibly be done etc. Now, a typical day for me has me often times not even getting up till noon, nor out of the house till 4 PM.

Not that I’m complaining about that[;)] in a way, it’s therapeutic realizing (for a change) that I don’t have to move until I want to.

It is for that reason though, I’m reluctant to make a “date” cause I wouldn’t want to send the wrong impression (ie that AG is a rat, he never shows up when he says he’s going to, etc) but we’ll see[:o)]

17

Well thanks, that pretty well describes what I’ve seen and heard. Any idea how much of all that was funded by GM vs the railroad?

Clearly much of it is ONLY to the benefit of GM, but just as clearly, not all of it . Much of whats out there is ONLY to the benefit of the railroad.