I know that E hunter Harrison invented it and I know that CN and CP practice it, but, at the risk of asking a stupid question, I do not know what it is or how it differs from regular railroading. I am interested in what the customers think of it also. Does it help or hurt reliability? Thanks in advance.
Every railroad practices a form of Precision Scheduled Railroading. The heart of it is having an operating plan that allows you to schedule shipments. That is, you know exactly how a car is supposed to move - which trains - which yards - what connections - and when it will arrive at the customer or interchange. You can use the plan to figure out your asset needs - crews, locomotives, mainlines, yards, etc. The goal is to have the most efficient plan you can and then tighten the assets to just fit the plan. EHH was a master at doing this.
The only real problem with doing this is figuring out how much "safety stock" you need to cover unexpected events. NS was cruising along in 2013 with excellent network velocity and shipment performance when the CBR traffic hit in 2014 along with a general rise in traffic. They didn't have enough crew hiring in the pipeline to cover it well. The RR went in the ditch and got congested. A congested RR consumes more assets than a free flowing one, so NS had to hire a huge amount of folk and get every locomotive they could get their hands on to to get out of the ditch. It took until 2015 to make this happen. Now, the RR is flowing freely again and the number of assets has been trimmed way back. (this on top of what's been going on with coal.)
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
All Class 1 carriers have scheduled trains on their intermodal, manifest and automotive trains and work hard to maintain those schedules. Where the rub comes in is with the unscheduled network of coal, CBR, ethanol, ore, and empties for each of those catagories. The scheduled network has great performance when it is the only game in town - it rarely is. All trains require the resources of manpower, motive power and track time - the more competition there is for these resources, the more difficult it becomes to keep all the parts moving - on schedule.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
"Precision Railroading" is a concept or dream that the real world converts into little more than a marketing buzzword. Others have indicated how freight flows vary and cause it to become imprecise.
Probably the best example of "Precision Railroading" in operation is Amtrak, with more or less fixed consists running on the same schedule every day. And we know how that works out in practice. Not all trains arrive on time , empty seats some days, while turning away customers at peak travel times.
oltmannd:BaltACD:
OK. My turn to ask a stupid question: What's this CBR traffic you mentioned?
ChuckAllen, TX
Crude by rail...CBR
From what I have read, CP usually finishes at the bottomof customer satisfaction polls. Personally I wouldn'tput EHH and trains running on schedule in the same paragraph. However, in a visit to the Canadian Prairies a year ago CP WAS doing a better job of keeping their trains on time than CN. But there was a simple reason for that: fewer trains on CP. The number of scheduled freights on CP's main line had dropped frm 7 or 8 each way a decade or so ago to four eah way. And now that number east of Winnipeg has dropped to three. As mentioned above, railroads seem to do well when traffic drops but have issues keeping their trains on time when traffic grows. Just ask UP.
Dick Eisfeller
It's not a new concept, by any means. I have a 1963 New York Central ETT. On the back cover is a drawing entitled "Operation Sunset," "Protected connections pay off - Let's roll as advertised."
The schematic shows desired arrival and departure times all along the line.
Elkhart was the busy place - everything went through there headed if headed east or west in that region.
Chicago area connections are shown as Cicero (CB&Q), Englewood (CRI&P), Bensenville (MILW), Proviso (CNW), Norpaul, Streator (ATSF), and Reddick (Wabash).
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
I am curious how they level out or predict the Grain Train traffic. I know that CP warned it could be a problem this year just based on the size of predicted shipments but it has to be hard to guess when the Grain Elevators will release shipments based on Commodity Price......especially magnified with the new 100 car unit train shipment levels they are moving too. I can see that if just 10 mega-elevators release 10 100-car shipments at once........it might cause an issue with traffic.
CMStPnPI am curious how they level out or predict the Grain Train traffic. I know that CP warned it could be a problem this year just based on the size of predicted shipments but it has to be hard to guess when the Grain Elevators will release shipments based on Commodity Price......especially magnified with the new 100 car unit train shipment levels they are moving too. I can see that if just 10 mega-elevators release 10 100-car shipments at once........it might cause an issue with traffic.
Communications between shipper, carrier and consignee. None of this takes place in a vacuum.
tree68 "Operation Sunset,"
"Operation Sunset,"
http://www.canadasouthern.com/caso/headlight/images/headlight-1261.pdf
wanswheel tree68 "Operation Sunset," http://www.canadasouthern.com/caso/headlight/images/headlight-1261.pdf
The blueprint/schematic is the drawing that appears on the timetable.
precision railroading at least at the BNSF before I retired was an oxymoron.
Interesting snippet in the newsletter
LAW BANNING PIGGYBACK FEE ... has been passed by the Texas legislature. The measure outlaws and makes void any provision in a teamster union contract imposing a $5 fee on truck lines using railroad piggyback service. The Texas lawmakers passed the bill in their lower house by 132 to 2, and in their Senate by 29 to 1. A similar law was recently enacted in Illinois.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.