Merger positions from the 4 major railroads

[Anonymous]

Last week, at the Rail Shippers Association national meeting, the railroad presidents gave their position on mergers. BNSF said the level of current interchange service between railroads is unacceptable and that mergers have improved service and reduced rates. CN said that mergers are inevitable and when it happens the railroads had better get it right. The NS said the rails need to increase value for industry without mergers. The UP said the rail industry is struggling to find the right formula, but must do so without mergers.
The interesting part of all this is, that the BN-ATSF merger was successful and worked very well. The CN-IC merger was successful and worked very well. The UP-SP merger was a disaster and the NS-CSX splitup of Conrail was a disaster. So now the UP and NS say mergers do not work, "just look at what happened to us".
Actually, the UP does not want a merger because they would lose business. The UP interchanges more freight to the eastern railroads than BNSF and after a merger the business would be more equal. The UP brings up their past failures with merger to lobby against new mergers. The BNSF and the CN have had no problems with mergers.
The shippers of this country will force the mergers as they want to deal with one carrier for their contracts just like they have with trucking companies.

[Anonymous]

I'm no authority, but it looks to me as if we are getting near the point where anti-trust will no longer permit mergers. It seems logical to me that less interchange traffic means less paperwork for the railroads. - Ed

[Anonymous]

Some interesting points concerning mergers;
If you fly from Atlanta to Denver on Delta Air lines , you go all the way on Delta , no interchange with another air carrier. If a shipper gives Roadway or Yellow 4 pallets of freight in Penn. to go to Texas, they will deliver all the way with no interchange. If a shipper gives J B Hunt or Schneider a truckload in North Carolina for Utah they will go all the way without interchange. The same goes for UPS, Fedex, etc. If a shipper gives a container to Maersk SeaLand in China for Chicago there is no interchange to another carrier. Same for P&O from Europe to Texas. Railroads are the only transport system where the major portion of the freight is interchanged between separate companies. That is why the mergers will come. The shipper customers want them.
I did not agree with the UP-SP merger and the breakup of Conrail. If these events had not occured, then we would have had three railroads in the east and three in the west and then three transcon railroads instead of just two. That would have been a better situation for competition. BNSF and Conrail together would have been very interesting.

[Anonymous]

I think that with the increase of intermodal shipping, you'll see less competition between the truckers and the railroaders and more coordination. They won't have a choice but to work together. This would also take the issue of transferring out of the equation, since a company can ship a stack from Long Beach to Chicago on the rails, then hand it off to a truck to take it the rest of the way.

As for more mergers, I'm middle of the road, but I do know a few people herr in Iowa who are still a little sore about the UP takeover of the C&NW, which for us was like the Yankees buying the Cubs.

[Anonymous]

I remember seing a quote from UP chief *** Davidson after the railroad got back on it's feet after the merger. 'there won't be another merger soon the customers don't want one'. I thought that was a classic PR smokescreen. After BN and Santa Fe mergered the ego's at UP would have deflated at that they no longer had the biggest RR. Look at how much they were willing to go after Santa Fe. They wanted the biggest railroad so went after SP and really stuffed it up. Yes I'm an SP fan and I lament the loss of my favourite RR but when/if future mergers occur high level management better listen to the guys in the field who run the yards and the trains instead of just saying this is the way we do things and you're going to do this way too.

[Anonymous]

Bluestreak1931, I agree with you 100%. There is a wrong way and a right way to merge. UP, CSX, and NS did it wrong... BN, ATSF, CN, IC ,WS did it right.

[BRAKIE]

It seems to me that that BIG 4 will become the BIG 2.I think it will be some time in coming,but it will happen.I really do not want to see it happen.I just hope the shippers and Feds just say NO MORE MERGERS! I don't think that will happen.I really don't.So,it is a matter of time after all.

Now a word on the split of Conrail.That was bound to happen.That was really a war between NS and CSX.Neither the NS or CSX could let one or the other have it all.Reason? Just look at the maps of Conrail,CSX and NS before the split.If you was CSX could you stand by and let NS have it all? If you was NS could you stand by and let CSX have it all? If NS got all of Conrail,CSX would be hurting,same for NS if CSX got Conrail.Both roads knew this.That is way both fought so hard to get Conrail intact.

About trucks.What most of the general public doesn't know about trucking,is that they have drop lots.One driver will haul the trailer a centain distance and drop it off in the drop lot.It may sit there for 2-4 days.Another driver will pick it up and take it to the final destination.This does not include the J.I.T (just in time) loads or other freight that needs expedite deliverly other then JIT. This of course does not include the independent truckers,mostly your larger truck lines will do this...When we load what is called a drop and hook trailer,it may sit in our lot 2-5 days before it is picked up.Should we load 1/2 trailer,when this trailer is picked up it may go to another company to be loaded if that company has only a 1/2 load headed in the same direction.This does not always happen.I have unloaded trailers with only 3-5 pallets on it.

[Anonymous]

Your trucking information is correct. But the shipper customer is only dealing with one truck line , not 2 or 3 companies as with a lot of rail freight.

[BRAKIE]

Jim,Not bad for fork lift driver huh? Now,you do know that some times one truck line will be pulling a trailer that belongs to another truck line.When I ask the trucker why he is pulling oh say, a Swift trailer,he will reply "It a drop lot deal".Do they interchange trailers like railroads does freight cars?????

[Anonymous]

Notice in NC that most JB Hunt containers are pulled by another truck company that hauls intermodals only.A lot of JB Hunt trucks haul their trailers not for intermodal service.I ask a JB Hunt driver and he said some coustomers say they dont woant it Railed.

[BRAKIE]

Hoyle,Thanks for the reply.I should have mention that these are none rail trailers ..There is one sure way you can tell if a trailer was shipped by train.The bills will be in the trailer and when you asked the trucker for the bills and he replys this is a rail trailer,a rail job or I picked it up at the railroad yard..If it was a dropped trailer he will have the bills or the bills will be in the nose box of the trailer if it was dropped in our recieving yard.again,thanks for the reply.

[Anonymous]

Truckers will sometimes pull another carriers' trailer because they made a mistake at the drop lot and pulled the wrong trailer or a shipper may load the wrong carriers' trailer at their dock. These are handled on a one time basis and the truck line will deliver the load all the way and then return the trailer to the correct carrier. With intermodal such as J B Hunt, Hunt may contract with a local trucker to pull their trailers to the rail yard. The shipper customer deals with Hunt only and has no contact with the local trucker.