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The state of American Railroads

Started by bwana39, March 30, 2021, 05:19:36 PM

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bwana39

It used to be that railroads ran everywhere. In the past four decades, we have lost numerous Class I railroads to consolidation. Consolidation has led to abandonment of trackage as well as track sales to regional short lines (Particularly Rail America and its subsidies.)

As the amount of long haul cargo has increased, overall rail cargo volumes have DECREASED. What that means is  that truck cargo has increased both in volume and in market share.  The result is the need for significantly more highway maintenance, upgrades, and construction.  Deregulation meant that trucking industry got to compete with the railroads in way that had never been possible. I think the railroads need to be profitable, the problem is we gave them incredible control over the public domain and they used it for the mutual benefit of their shareholders and the community. Now, as a whole, it is one-sided favoring the railroad companies. I am sure they would cry otherwise.

We need to get a whole lot of the truck volume off of the highways. The best way to do this is rail.  Containers of trailer trains are the best way to do this. Even Wal-Mart who was almost as zero rail use company has gotten on board.

Let's build what we need as economically as possible.


Dirt Roads

The most recent rationale for railroads dropping in market share is related to a management theory called Precision Scheduling Railroading.  Hawked by the famous modern rail baron E. Hunter Harrison, the process is to block out track time for longer trains and eliminate rail yard switching.  It's highly controversial, but effective.  But railroads are now totally dependent on the ability of large shippers to produce or consume "stuff" in unit trains upwards of 130 railcars or so.

Max Rockatansky

The problem was there was way too many lines and it was more convenient to use trucks once roads got good.  Granted good roads sure played a part in why so many freight lines became obsolete. 

mgk920

Also 'Rail Baron' games where railroads would practice 'defensive' abandonments for no other reasons than to keep competitors out.  Many places were losing their rail service throughout the 20th century due to that.

The USA's federal government nationalized the country's railroads during WWI, this due to their unwillingness to handle the critical military transportation needs during the conflict.  IMHO, when they were denationlized after the War ended, the mistake that was made was that the government should have retained ownership of the track infrastructure (like how privately developed 'turnpike' toll roads were pretty much all owned by various government agencies long before then), including train dispatching, while returning train operations to the private sector, with no restrictions on where they could and could not go and who they could and could not serve.

Treat the railroad operating companies like we do trucking companies, bus companies, airlines and so forth and IMHO, they would flourish.

Mike

kkt

Another issue, though, is that railroads are unionized and trucking is not.  So unscrupulous trucking companies have a great incentive to cut corners.

Dirt Roads

Quote from: mgk920 on March 31, 2021, 12:53:13 AM
Treat the railroad operating companies like we do trucking companies, bus companies, airlines and so forth and IMHO, they would flourish.

The point of all of this is that the railroads are flourishing, but as the OP said the total volume has decreased.  Class 1 railroads are getting quite focused on lowering the overall costs of providing transportation for ultra-high volume (and therefore, highly profitable) customers.  As a railroader, I don't see that as bad at all.  But I am concerned about the impact of potential economic factors that could affect a huge segment of that type of traffic.  (Right now, the railroads are suffering from the loss of coal and some loss of crude oil shipments).  Another area that is sure to have already hit hard is the supply chain issues in the computer and technology industry.

The main point that the OP is pushing is utilization of the railroads as a means of getting truck volume off the highways.  That requires a "freight forwarding" approach whereby the middleman constructs a huge facility near a traffic generator (let's say the Port of Long Beach) and builds 130-car equivalent piggyback trains.  On the other end, another middleman constructs a huge facility near a major destination (Chicago) to receive and distribute the traffic.  The two Class 1 railroads serving POLA/POLB already offer this service, so it needs to be focused on shippers that don't fit within that mantra.  It's huge gamble (probably worth taking).  It gets way more complicated when adding smaller traffic generators and smaller destinations.

kernals12

Rail's freight mode share is much higher in the US than it is in Europe.

D-Dey65

Quote from: kkt on March 31, 2021, 12:57:52 AM
Another issue, though, is that railroads are unionized and trucking is not.  So unscrupulous trucking companies have a great incentive to cut corners.

And how long have the Teamsters been around?


zachary_amaryllis

i don't know about freight... but amtrak is a joke.

in europe, one can take a train pretty much between any two random towns. here, one has to drive a good distance in some cases to catch a train. like, there's an amtrak stop in pueblo, but not colorado springs (i think) even though pueblo is ... well, not much of anything. same for la junta.

the i-25 corridor is begging for some form of commuter rail, and the tracks already exist, but bnsf / up wants too much to 'rent' them or whatever that arrangement is.
clinched:
I-64, I-80, I-76 (west), *64s in hampton roads, 225,270,180 (co, wy)

kernals12

Quote from: zachary_amaryllis on April 01, 2021, 08:53:55 AM
i don't know about freight... but amtrak is a joke.

in europe, one can take a train pretty much between any two random towns. here, one has to drive a good distance in some cases to catch a train. like, there's an amtrak stop in pueblo, but not colorado springs (i think) even though pueblo is ... well, not much of anything. same for la junta.

the i-25 corridor is begging for some form of commuter rail, and the tracks already exist, but bnsf / up wants too much to 'rent' them or whatever that arrangement is.

Whenever my family goes to Europe and we aren't venturing out of the city we rent a car. One time after touring a perfume factory at a small town in the South of France, we found ourselves stranded with no idea how to get back to the train station. After lots of arguing and stress, we finally found a bus station.

Public transit sucks.

GaryV

If you rented a car, why did you need to find a train station?


kernals12

Quote from: GaryV on April 01, 2021, 10:38:49 AM
If you rented a car, why did you need to find a train station?

That time we didn't, and my Dad agreed that was a huge mistake

bwana39

Quote from: kernals12 on April 01, 2021, 08:17:25 AM
Rail's freight mode share is much higher in the US than it is in Europe.

Europe's import levels are also lower than the US.

Quote from: D-Dey65 on April 01, 2021, 08:31:49 AM
Quote from: kkt on March 31, 2021, 12:57:52 AM

And how long have the Teamsters been around?


The teamsters have minimal presence in long-haul trucking these days.  Most of the legacy union trucking companies were merged, spun off, marginalized, and sent off to bankruptcy (while the investors took the assets that had long-term value and created "new" transportation companies that had no unions or unfunded pension / benefit obligations.

I may not be a fan of unions, but the way ownership groups just threw away the obligations that they had made to (predominately) union employees is morally inconceivable.
Let's build what we need as economically as possible.



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