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News Wire: Union won’t accept Harrison’s blame for CSX service failures

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Posted by Brian Schmidt on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 3:33 PM

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The union representing CSX Transportation conductors and other operating employees has a message for CEO E. Hunter Harrison: Don’t blame us for the railroad’s service problems. Last month, in a letter to CSX cu...

http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2017/08/08-csx-and-unions

Brian Schmidt, Editor, Classic Trains magazine

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Posted by Ulrich on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 7:59 PM

Always a bad sign when no one will take responsibility. 

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Posted by CMStPnP on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 8:07 PM

Well the problem with EHH blaming the Union is the Union was at CSX when EHH was running around telling everyone he could fix CSX......soooooo.     If he can't work with the Union.........whose fault was it to make the claim in the first place he could fix CSX.    So most people are not going to listen to the finger pointing in this case.

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Posted by Euclid on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 8:13 PM

I don't see anything that says EHH blamed the union or its members.  What I see is the union acting like EHH blamed them.

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Posted by BaltACD on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 9:36 PM

Euclid
I don't see anything that says EHH blamed the union or its members.  What I see is the union acting like EHH blamed them.

EHH blamed everybody not named EHH.

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Euclid on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 9:49 PM

BaltACD
 
Euclid
I don't see anything that says EHH blamed the union or its members.  What I see is the union acting like EHH blamed them.

 

EHH blamed everybody not named EHH.

 

I am talking about a specific fact, and you are making up slogans and platitudes.

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Posted by Euclid on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 9:54 PM

What I can't help notice is how much the protesting of EHH sounds just like the protesting of Trump by the Democrats.  In both cases, it comes across as being a tactic.   

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Posted by Ulrich on Tuesday, August 8, 2017 10:41 PM

I've often wondered why the Peter Principle somehow never applied to the big shots at the very top. Well.. I wonder no more.. 

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Posted by tree68 on Wednesday, August 9, 2017 6:54 AM

Euclid

I don't see anything that says EHH blamed the union or its members.  What I see is the union acting like EHH blamed them.

Last month, in a letter to CSX customers, Harrison said employee resistance to change has resulted in service disruptions.

Considering that most of the employees are members of one union or another, I'd say he pretty specifically blamed  them for the problems at CSX.

This would be as opposed to saying that the new policies and procedures he's called for are to blame, which seems to be the general consensus.

He's doing nothing other than trying to transfer the blame for his (or his handlers) bad decisions to someone else.

 

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Posted by cprtrain on Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:14 PM

Harrison is a cancer who loves to blame anyone but himself. He created a mess at CP and is in the process of destroying CSX. He is not respected but is hated by the employees. He'll be gone shortly, leaving a railroad that has destroyed customer service, employee morale and investor confidence. Three strikes and you're out!

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Posted by CShaveRR on Wednesday, August 9, 2017 7:42 PM

It doesn't work.  There are three groups of people that have to be satisfied on a railroad:  customers, employees, and owners.  He's trying to pander to one at the expense of the other two, and it won't work.

"Resistance" to change might be caused by a little more than fighting for rights or tradition.  "Here, why don't we see if we can run one train instead of two down Sand Patch, using only two units...look at all the money we'll save!"

And if it doesn't work, we'll fall back on resistance to change and operator error.

Carl

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Posted by BaltACD on Thursday, August 10, 2017 7:10 AM

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by BaltACD on Thursday, August 10, 2017 8:41 AM

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Los Angeles Rams Guy on Thursday, August 10, 2017 11:51 AM

cprtrain

Harrison is a cancer who loves to blame anyone but himself. He created a mess at CP and is in the process of destroying CSX. He is not respected but is hated by the employees. He'll be gone shortly, leaving a railroad that has destroyed customer service, employee morale and investor confidence. Three strikes and you're out!

 

+1

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Posted by Electroliner 1935 on Friday, August 11, 2017 3:42 PM

June 2017 issue of Cincinnati Railroad Clubs HEADLIGHT & MARKER publication has the following:

Queensgate Problems Gary Woods calls it a meltdown. CSX trains are getting out of the yard OK but aren’t getting in. North of the Ohio, between the yard and Hamilton, there are southbound trains in the hole, some waiting on crews. This has an effect on NS as well, as the two roads share trackage in some spots. I saw an NS northbound waiting in Hamilton, south of the old station, as a train blocked the main at Butler Street. Shared running means that trains must move. Gary says that railfans have reported CSX trains backed up on the Indiana Sub, Short Line and the CC Sub also. I have seen trains stopped north of Symmes Road (no crew), and Mulhauser. It seems that most crews are being put on at sidings. Gary says that the only good news is the job that the Dayshift LA Dispatcher is doing. Could this mess possibly be the upcoming (rumored) flattening of Queensgate? 

(On 6/14 Gary Woods shot a half-dozen trains involved in the Queensgate mess between Hamilton and the yard. Both held up southbound blocking northbounds. CSX is the culprit, but because of shared trackage, NS got caught. Notice the BNSF and CN power, too.)

Sorry, I can't copy the photos.

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Posted by cx500 on Friday, August 11, 2017 4:05 PM

Stage the train in an on-line siding and the cars don't count in the "Yard Dwell" column.  And if you redesignate the hot train as a "Local" it no longer drags down the train velocity.  Lots of tricks to fudge the statistics, and they still go the wrong way.  Might fool the analysts, but the shippers waiting for cars know better.....

Probably "Cars on Line" is the best measure of how they are doing, but I am not sure if that includes cars waiting on a customer's siding, or trying to get to a plugged interchange track.

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Posted by BaltACD on Friday, August 11, 2017 4:41 PM

Even fudging the books, the EHH Clusterecluck is making laps around the drain - going down.

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Posted by Paul of Covington on Friday, August 11, 2017 6:06 PM

Electroliner 1935
This has an effect on NS as well, as the two roads share trackage in some spots. I saw an NS northbound waiting in Hamilton, south of the old station, as a train blocked the main at Butler Street. Shared running means that trains must move.

   In this type of situation, does NS have any recourse to recover losses resulting from consistent and repeated delays?

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