Dave,I have also seen empty auto parts cars being stored in transit-that's what they was called since these was assigned pool cars for the now closed GM body plant in Ontario,Ohio..I asked a conductor..I don't quite understand how a empty can be classified as being stored in transit..
I do know NS charged a switching fee to spot those cars..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
L&M RRThe term for stopping and holding a car between origin and destination, and also for loads that are picked up, and held, until the carload is sold, and ordered moved on to destination was "stoppage in transit".......and customarily called for a per diem demurrage charge on the car...plus a charge for pulling that car out of a line, and hooking to an outbound train........
I believe the term is "storage in transit". In order for demurrage to apply the car has to be "constructively placed". If it doesn't have a destination then it can't be constructively placed.
There may be storage charge (or not if the car is held on private or leased track). Also wrapped up in you discussion are "diversion charges". It was very common for perishables na dlumber to be loaded and shipped east and during transit the brokers would sell the car to its actual consignee and the shipper would divert the car to the new destination.
Storage in transit (SIT) is very big in the chemical industry. It is very common to have carloads of plastics handled that way. Here is a SIT yard north of Huston at Spring, TX. Almost 1000 car of plastic pellets are stored here. None of these cars are on demurrage by the way (private cars on leased track).
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
The term for stopping and holding a car between origin and destination, and also for loads that are picked up, and held, until the carload is sold, and ordered moved on to destination was "stoppage in transit".......and customarily called for a per diem demurrage charge on the car...plus a charge for pulling that car out of a line, and hooking to an outbound train........
worked the very same way as running a unsold load into a commercial bonded warehouse, to be held until sold, then pulling it out, and forwarding it on.........."in and out" charged, plus a per diem storage charge.
wor
mechengr When rail cars (passenger or freight) are sitting on a siding or in a yard, what term (word) is used to describe their situation - i.e.are they "parked" or is some other term applied to rail cars? One's mind goes into "deep" thinking at times.
When rail cars (passenger or freight) are sitting on a siding or in a yard, what term (word) is used to describe their situation - i.e.are they "parked" or is some other term applied to rail cars?
One's mind goes into "deep" thinking at times.
On the Norfolk Southern, we call cars that have been put at an industry to be loaded or unloaded either SPOTTED or PLACED. And cars removed are called PULLED. On the actual work order the term PLACE is used rather than SPOT/SPOTTED, but most crews use a variant of SPOT to designate it.
If for whatever reason a crew leaves the same industries extra cars sitting on their lead not at a loading or unloading location, or if a crew leaves cars for a different industry on another industry's tracks, those such cars are considered to be HUNG OUT. Sometimes this is because the spot locations are all full, other times it's because you don't plan to go into the other industry that day, but have cars in your train that you don't want to have to take back to the yard with you. You'll often hear phrases like "Leave those two cars hung out at the derail", or "Hang those sand cars out on the paper recycling lead", or other similar terminology.
The railroad is getting more picky about what you can and can not put on your work order as for reason codes, but years back, a lot of times on whatever the crew's "Friday" (meaning last working day of the week) was...it was not uncommon for most or all of your train to be hung out somewhere.
Another term that I don't think I've seen used by any other reply is "shoving off". We often say we shoved cars off in a siding or yard track.
But as other have said "Set Out" or "Set Off" are common terms to describe the same thing.
Dave wrote:
Demurrage ONLY accrues if the load is placed or constructively placed NOT, repeat NOT due to delays in transit. Demurrage does not, repreat not accrue to the owner of the car, it only accrues to the railroad serving the customer.
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Sorry Dave but,if a empty foreign road car is on your rails a fee will be paid to the owning road if not why hustle empties back to their owners in a timely manner? I was taught that as a student brakeman and the same holds true today unless that foreign road car is in pool service..IF this wasn't the case UP could hold C&HV boxcar for months and nothing could be said...Of course that would never happen because UP wouldn't want to pay C&HV any fees for holding that car.That's why railroads has that fee.
Every major railroad suffers terminal dwell time so that boxcar will sit in a yard or transfer track for hours or a day .Of course this is figured into the transit time.This is why it may take 3 days for a freight car to go 150 miles and this is why trucks kills the short haul business.
A furniture factory in NC orders a boxcar load of wood from a lumber mill in Washington state. The lumber mill calls the BN and the WP (this is prior to all the megamergers) and requests a shipping quote. That quote is going to contain all the costs, including demurrage (currently 30-100 dollars per day) at both ends. The quote will also indicate the car grade required. If your shipping wood you want a clean leak proof car that didn't have manure as its last load. (paper products always required the cleanest cars.) The WP wins the contract. The route is going to be WP-UP-DRGW-SOU-N&W (this is an example only, that route may not exist). The BN would have gone BN-NYC-CHESSIE-N&W. These routes are official approved station to station routes. Every load going from Station code A to Station code Z on the WP follows this same route.
Now the WP searches for a suitable boxcar in its closest yard. The noon turn is bringing back an empty SOU boxcar that's a fit. There is also a WP boxcar in the yard that can be used. Which one to use? Depends, it's possible that the SOU and WP have a deal, "You send me my car back with a load in it and I'll refund the car hire". So we pick the SOU car and spot it at the lumber mill. They have 24 hours to load it or demurrage kicks in. They calls us, we pick the car up and sent it on its way. We car racking up car hire at the rate of x cents per mile and y cents per hour. Car hire goes from midnight to midnight so we want that SOU car off our rails before midnight. We drop it of at the WP-UP interchange track and hand the waybill to the UP. Now the UP is racking up car hire charges payable to the SOU.
Car then gets handled off to the DRGW who delivers it to the SOU who gives it to the N&W who spots it at the factory. The shipping contract gives them 48 hours to unload before our buddy demurrage kicks in. The N&W is racking up car hire during this process.
Our car is emptied, picked up by the N&W and dropped off at the SOU interchange track. Car hire ends at this point.
Who gets money ? Everyone, WP gets a chunk because they got the deal, UP, DRGW, SOU and N&W all get a predetermined piece of the pie. Who pays, Everybody owes SOU the ICC determined car hire, but the WP will get theirs back since they sent a load back in the car.
This is a simplistic example of how it worked in the good old days. In the 1990's the Class 1's and big car leasing companies petitioned the ICC to let the railroads determine the car hire rates among themselves. Since anti-trust among the class 1's was big deal back then (we had to have legal counsel present at a lot of out design meets to make sure we didn't cross over the allowed line.)
Here's a good explanation of current day practices.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/932469/how_railroad_cars_earn_money_for_the.html?cat=3
Bruce
BRAKIE Sorry Dave,You fail to see the whole picture..
Actually I work with some of the guys that figure this sort of stuff out for a class one railroad and trust me, a sitting car is a money loser.
That empty car is making demurrage money as long as it sits in another railroad's terminal.A empty car sitting for weeks on home rails makes no money.
Actually its the opposite. Demurrage is paid when a car is suposed to be loaded or unloaded and the industry does not do so within the required time. It is a penalty the industry pays for delaying the car. So if the car is not placed or constructively placed, demurrage cannot be charged. If a car is just intransit in a yard, it does not accrue demurrage. Plus demurrage is paid to the serving railroad, not the railroad owning the car. Demurrage only accrues on a railroad owned car and does not accrue on a private car (or railroad car leased by the customer) on a private track (or railroad track leased by the customer).
So if the BNSF spots a C&HV boxcar at an industry in San Diego, and the industry does not load it for 4 days the BNSF, not the C&HV, collects demurrage.
A enroute shipment stopped in a 20-40 hour terminal dwell time is still making money because its still enroute unlike a empty would-unless of course its collecting demurrage fees for its owning railroad.
Ever wonder why railroads hustle empties back to their home rails or the nearest connecting road? Nobody wants to pay demurrage fees which can become quite expensive by the time you start adding the daily fees for X Many cars found on your rails.I am sure you will stand before the man answering questions about those fees.
You are confusing per diem or car hire with demurrage. Completely different things. Different rates, different conditions, different measures.
You may have the last shot, but I can assure you that a standing car is a hole you are throwing money down. Yes the railroad gets car hire, yes under certain conditions they can collect demurrage, but the costs of the stopped car, the lost opportunity cost of not getting that next loading, far outweigh any benefit of the car hire or demurrage.
Dave-the-TrainIt occurs to me that one area that can cause confusion can be when anyone says that cars to be collected or left on a spot are "in front of" or "behind" cars already on a track. Neither term is really clear as to whether it means the cars are on the approach side of the cars already there or beyond them.
No confusion. A car that sits third behind two others is referred to as being "third out", etc.
Sorry Dave,You fail to see the whole picture..
BRAKIE Two ways that a steanding car makes money: 1)Its a enroute load in terminal dwell time. 2) The owning railroad is collecting demurrage fees..
Two ways that a steanding car makes money:
1)Its a enroute load in terminal dwell time.
2) The owning railroad is collecting demurrage fees..
Can't agree.
1. A car loaded or empty sitting in a yard makes nobody any money, loaded or empty. Its a money loser for the railroad and for the customer. Taking it to the extreme, if I get $2000 for a shipment and I let the the car sit in the yard for 2 years, I am earning $1000 a year with the car. If I let the the car sit in the yard for 4 years, I am earning $500 a year with the car. If I let the the car sit in the yard for 4 years, I am earning $500 a year with the car. If I let the the car sit in the yard for 10 years, I am earning $200 a year with the car. Exagerated point I know, but the concept is the same. The longer the car sits the less opportunity i have to make money with it and the longer time I have to spread the revenue over. Over an entire system, cutting a couple hours of terminal dwell out of the overall transit times is worth millions of a dollars. The longer a car sits in the yard the more cars you need, the more tracks you need to build, the more handling costs you have, the more maintenance costs you have.
A car sitting in a yard waiting for the next train is a money loser.
2. Demurrage runs what, about $75 dollars a day? Assume that a car get only 2 loads a month. 15 days of demurrage at $75 a day is $1125. If the car can generate more than $1125 of revenue with a load, then the railroad is losing money on demurrage. If its a high priced load such as chemicals or auto parts or such that generates thousands of dollars of revenue and turns quickly where it can get 3-4 loads a month, then demurrage is huge money loser.
If stopped cars make a railroad money then how come every time a railroad's operations bog down and cars start sitting the railroad starts bleeding cash? If stopped cars make money, then when the railroads bog down their revenue ought to go up.
The only time stopped cars make money is storage in transit where a company warehouses their product in privately owned cars and store them on railroad owned tracks. The industry trades costs of warehousing with for the cost of lost equipment utilization and the railroad makes money on the lease of the tracks.
dehusman I side with Chuck, in the vast majority of cases, moving cars are making money, standing cars are costing money. If a standing car is making money, it is making waaaaaaaaay less money than it could be moving. Dave H.
I side with Chuck, in the vast majority of cases, moving cars are making money, standing cars are costing money.
If a standing car is making money, it is making waaaaaaaaay less money than it could be moving.
Dave H.
I think that I covered this...
A car standing to be loaded/unloaded and/or waiting for such and/or delayed by someone other than the RR will be earning revenue. Maybe not so much but it will not be costing money.
Similarly a car standing on home lines may be considered neutral. So long as it isn't still being paid for it's only cost on home tracks should be the right off of its original cost. Of course one would not want it to be displacing home road stock onto other RR tracks that will be charged for... one reason out-of-use cars get scrapped rather than mothballed... all depends on how much spare yard space or "dead"/umused spurs you have available.
Then again, the significant point that both the real RR overlooked at times and modellers miss is that non-paying back hauls for cars to get to their next job or take the next load in captive service (e.g. mine runs) cost at least fuel and crew time. if they travel over another RR's tracks they may incur a further cost there as well. As I said, the costs of backhaul should be factored into the charge to the customer but they didn't always get it right... or it could over-price the job and the RR would lose out to another (as in the BN example) or to trucking.
Another example of cars on the move being a cost... loco fuel had to be shipped out from source to depots. That was a straight cost in providing cars, crews, track occupancy (instead of revenue earning cars), maintenance and labour... plus the caol (or oil) they shipped had to be bought in. I guess that this is an explanation for modern locos being fuelled direct by on hand local suppliers... I hadn't thought of that.
Similarly MoW cars are facilitating revenue earning but costing money (whether rolling or standing) not earning it.
dehusman Dave-the-Train tomikawaTTPart of the confusion in terminology is the need to explain why a car is standing still, rather than moving. Moving cars are making money, standing cars cost money. I would disagree with this ( a bit pedantically)... I side with Chuck, in the vast majority of cases, moving cars are making money, standing cars are costing money. If a standing car is making money, it is making waaaaaaaaay less money than it could be moving. Dave H.
Dave-the-Train tomikawaTTPart of the confusion in terminology is the need to explain why a car is standing still, rather than moving. Moving cars are making money, standing cars cost money. I would disagree with this ( a bit pedantically)...
tomikawaTTPart of the confusion in terminology is the need to explain why a car is standing still, rather than moving. Moving cars are making money, standing cars cost money.
I would disagree with this ( a bit pedantically)...
Paul_D_North_Jrbut other terms that come to mind are ''stored'', ''moth-balled'', ''inactive'', etc. ''Laid-up'' is sometimes used for locomotives under repair, but sometimes also for ''stored inactive'
Locomotives are stored; Dead stored, stored servicable, or stored unservicable. Ships get laid up and moth-balled or cosmolined (sp?) at least on the western roads. Maybe it is different elseware. I think Jeff said it best... Ask 100 different railroaders and you will get 200 different answers.
meI don't know if this applies in the US but here we describe cars near the switch of a blind spur as "on top of" cars deeper into the spur. In railway terms this simply means that you have to pull any cars "on top of" other cars on a track out to get at the cars they are "on top of".
It occurs to me that one area that can cause confusion can be when anyone says that cars to be collected or left on a spot are "in front of" or "behind" cars already on a track. Neither term is really clear as to whether it means the cars are on the approach side of the cars already there or beyond them.
Empty cars not waiting to be loaded cost money... at least if they are on someone else's track and empty cars on your own track aren't returning the investment in them or the track.
Standing cars can be part way through a journey, waiting to be loaded/unloaded or (and this was my original thoughton the point) they can be acting as temporary/mobile warehouses for the load's owners. Bulk commodities such as ore and coalcould be moved up fromthe mines to close to ports and held ready for peak demand.
This especially applied where several different types or grades of the product occurred. Rather than try to guess what amounts of which specific material would be wanted the producers or mddle men would hold stocks in reserve.
The stocks could be held at the mine or somewhere else on the ground but handling on and off the ground took time, cost money and could degrade the material. (It could particularly make coalmore dusty). Also, when the product had to be loaded into a ship, they wanted to turn the ship round as fast as possible - a ship standing "idle" costing a lot more thn a train or three. So it paid to have a percentage of coal, ore or whatever else on hand in cars waiting to be rolled forward on demand.
I believe that this also applied to a degree with grain products.
This has changed drastically in the last couple of decades with increasing "Just in time" delivery... so, as always, practices are very era specific.
At the same time I am aware that some products (specifically coffee beans) are shipped in containers and sent off on what looks like a pointless journey all over the planet... the explanation is is that it is both cheaper to have them in containers than in warehouses and they are covered by someone else's insurance... plus when they eventually arrive on time they have nearly completed their maturing process and they are close to readyto be processed.
Standing cars booked to be received from the RR or collected by it also earn money. I a car or cars cannot be where they are supposed to be at the booked time (plus or minus an allowance) they are charged for.
The reverse also applies in that cars delivered late may be rolling but penalties for late delivery can be building up against them. In modern terms this is called "time sensitive delivery". In earlier eras when the RR was pretty much the only means of getting loads long distances they felt that they didn't have to be bothered about this (except where they interfaced with shipping). The RRs' failure to get up to speed and get the right approach to customers was a lot of the cause of their losing out to truck companies... who said "Yes sir!", "Can do" and delivered on time... Instead of "Huh?", "Yeah... Maybe", "We'll see if we can fit you in" and "Yeah, your load's held up..."
I can never recall the charging for non-moveement terms correctly but they involve demurage and standage. These charges apply whether cars are empty or loaded. It also applies to cars that are blocked in or blocked out by a third party's car(s) that can't be moved (for whatever reason). In this case the charges will be either past on by the original customer or levied directly by the RR depending on the specific situation. This is a big reason why customerson a spur want to load/umload their cars smartly. It also plays a big partin where a customer wants to be along the spur and/or whether the cost of installing and maintaining a siding of their own is justified.
Moving cars don't make money if they have to be back hauled empty or otherwise run around without a paying load in them (or on the way to a nearby paying load). Empty cars are dead weight that take up train space and cost fuel and crew time to re-position for their next load.
This is why there are all the interchange rules about sending foreign road cars back to their home road or forward with another (subsequent) load... and why the are pool cars, Railbox/Railgon and (from the opposite point of view) restricted traffic cars (as in "when empty return to..." and "Steel Pipe loading only").
Some years ago Trains mag had an article about BN getting a huge contract from under the noses of the opposition RRs. The reason BN could undercut them was that they organised three loaded legs with short empty hops between so thet their trains ran loaded for an extremely high percentage of the route. The other RRs were back-hauling empty so that they couldn't do better than 50% loaded.
All the costs of empty haulage have to be covered by the prices that can be obtained for loaded haulage and standing. In adition both the idle time and track for cars to stand idle on has to be covered. This is why even quite new cars get scrapped if they aren't getting enough use. (That's a whole different subject).
Meanwhile back at the OP...
tomikawaTT Railroads have to put every car in a very specific place for a very specific reason.
Being pedantic some more...
RR have to spot cars in "very specific places" to varying degrees.
Sometimes that is as specific as adjacent to a loading door across a platform or over/under a loading shute. A lot of the time it is only as specific as on a spur or track. Sometimes it need only be in a particular yard. The differences are loading to/from an icehouse, locating on a teamtrack with good access along its whole length and a yard that takes train loads of just one product (e.g. coal) of one type/grade as an ongoing massive order wth the RR in which the specific cars are only identified for maintenance and by weight of load delivered.
When things are bad/ traffic is low a lot of cars may be parked on a spur as they arrive with little or no sorting into type or condition. Thye cars aren't earning money so there is a question about incentive to spend crew time and fuel shuffling them about. If on the other hand there are a number of spurs available cars might be spotted by type and/or age or condition... or most likely to be wanted sooner...
Sometimes doing non-rail work over the last few years I have learnt, by causing panic, that the railway uses word differently...
I don't know if this applies in the US but here we describe cars near the switch of a blind spur as "on top of" cars deeper into the spur. In railway terms this simply means that you have to pull any cars "on top of" other cars on a track out to get at the cars they are "on top of".
As an example a car can have twenty, fiftyor whatever cars on top of it. This doesn't mean a huge pile of cars! On the other hand warehouse managers can get a bit upset when I tell them that I've put a dozen pallets of goo on top of another dozen already in a location... I know that they are all in a line like freight cars but the managers just don't seem to comprehend that...
To a lesser extent we also say that a car is "buried" under a number of other cars - especially when the number of other cars is high.
Thinking about it we can also say that a car is "lost" or talk of "losing" a car. We don't actually mean that we don't know where it is... we tend to mean that it is out of the way (if it's unlikely to be wanted for sometime) or put out of sight (of managers)(for reasons that I can't imagine...)
Actually losing a car, train set/block of cars is far from unknown. I've even known of an atomic flask being lost. For some reason quite a few people got a bit upset...
Hope this is of some use.
Set Out.....A car or cars that have been set out are cars that have been placed on an auxiliary track by a train or engine, as in "the local set those cars out at the brewery." Cars that have been set out may be "spotted"
Spotted....To spot a car means to place it in a precise location, usually at an industry served by the railroad. Example would be the local set out those cars at the brewery, but the need to be spotted for loading.
Tied Down.....This term has grown in frequency as a generic term for leaving equipment someplace. Its origins come from the application of a handbrake and sometimes a rail skid or chocks or by chaining the equipment to the rail to prevent uncontolled movement of the equipment, in essence "tying the equipment down. To tie down something now generically means to leave it somewhere, applying the handbrake and air brakes and other measures as needed under the rules to prevent its uncontrolled movement, as in "that cut of cars has been tied down on the lead for 4 hours". Its precise meaning still refers only to the practice of securing the equipment.
So, if euipment has been set out, spotted and tied down.............never mind.
Howdy Richard; My first full time job out of High School was at Pillar Furniture Mfg. Pillar had a spur served by the SP with three “spots” for (1) lumber yard, (2) receiving and (3) shipping. Pillar would specify where the car should be spotted. If the spot was occupied the SP would “set out” the car at the head end of the spur to be spotted when the specified spot was clear. Both the SP and customer used the same terminology. Some businesses have “spot” numbers on the doors.
Have fun, Rob
Paul_D_North_Jr jeffhergert I think you could ask a 100 different railroaders and probably get a 100 different answers. Terms in general usage one place may get you blank stares somewhere else, even on the same railroad. If you said to me those cars were "parked," I would think they were in long term storage. [snip] Not disagreeing at all - but other terms that come to mind are ''stored'', ''moth-balled'', ''inactive'', etc. ''Laid-up'' is sometimes used for locomotives under repair, but sometimes also for ''stored inactive''. Jeff's 1st para. above sums it up. - Paul North.
jeffhergert I think you could ask a 100 different railroaders and probably get a 100 different answers. Terms in general usage one place may get you blank stares somewhere else, even on the same railroad. If you said to me those cars were "parked," I would think they were in long term storage. [snip]
If you said to me those cars were "parked," I would think they were in long term storage. [snip]
Not disagreeing at all - but other terms that come to mind are ''stored'', ''moth-balled'', ''inactive'', etc. ''Laid-up'' is sometimes used for locomotives under repair, but sometimes also for ''stored inactive''. Jeff's 1st para. above sums it up.
- Paul North.
Indeed.
On the PRR those were destination cuts such as:
Chicago,Detroit,C&O,N&W,NYC,B&O,Sands(Sandusky),Pitts(Pittsburgh) local,home storage etc.
Basically the same on the C&O under the Chessie banner except for the cars destination being different.
Part of the confusion in terminology is the need to explain why a car is standing still, rather than moving. Moving cars are making money, standing cars cost money.
A 'spotted' car is one which has been put where needed to load, unload, be repaired or whatever. A 'dropped' car is one which, having been left by a passing train, requires some TLC to get it in position for the next move in the sequence that will eventually get it to a spot. As Rich said, the only cars usually referred to as 'parked' are those which are temporarily surplus to requirements.
Frequently cars are referred to by present location (in Extra 2101, at Burns Fuel #2 rack, on track 4, going to XYZ interchange...) rather than by such a generic term as 'parked.'
Mundanes park their (rubber-tired) cars wherever is convenient. Railroads have to put every car in a very specific place for a very specific reason.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - car cards, waybills, TTTO 24/30)
I think you could ask a 100 different railroaders and probably get a 100 different answers. Terms in general usage one place may get you blank stares somewhere else, even on the same railroad.
If you said to me those cars were "parked," I would think they were in long term storage. If you said those cars were "spotted up," I would think they were at a customers dock being loaded/unloaded. If you said those cars were "set out," I would think they were waiting to be switched or picked up by another train (block swapping).
Jeff
I wouldn't say "parked". Re Jim's comment, cars are "set out" on a siding and then "picked up" by another train later. It kinda refers more to the action of setting out a car I think?? I've usually just heard them as being "in the side track" or "on track 3" etc., though perhaps "sitting" might work (i.e. "that Conrail boxcar is sitting in the cement company spur track".)??
Sometimes they are 'set out'....
Jim
Modeling BNSF and Milwaukee Road in SW Wisconsin
Richard