Issuing Track Warrants

[wayne]

Recently I have overheard(on the scanner) the engineeror conductor asking the dispatcher for a track warrant (this is for leaving Auburn,WA on the Stampede Pass Wye) and the dispatcher said they would have one in 15-20 min. For what reasons would the dispather put them off? Also, is this information transmitted electronically to the train as well as the verbal tranmission? How do the engineers/conductors record all that info so quickly if it is only transmitted verbally? When the track warrant finally came it was for about 16 miles and they were told to park it and wait for another. This is on a line that 2-4 trains daily!!! Any clues???

[Anonymous]

Wayne:

1. The dispatcher may have put off the train because (a) he was just about to do a transfer to his relief (the end of his shift); (b) he had more pressing things to attend to (dispatchers often handle 40-50 trains at once); and most likely, (c): he knew the train was going to be parked, so why ru***o do something when he had something more important to do first? Dispatching is all about prioritizing. Any dispatcher who handles things first-come, first-serve, will grind his territory into the dirt.

2. The information is transmitted verbally. The train crew has a preprinted form. They check the appropriate boxes and fill in the appropriate blanks. It's not hard.

3. Trains are parked for a broad variety of good reasons, such as:
a. The yard can't take the train
b. A connecting railroad can't take the train
c. There's a maintenance window that will be too costly to bust for one train
d. There's no rested crew available to take the train at the next crew change.
e. There's "no room at the inn" -- if the dispatcher advances the train, he'll plug the railroad and then nothing will move.
f. The customer can't accept the train for awhile (common with coal, grain, containers)
g. And so on.

OS

[Anonymous]

There could have been some MOW work happening ahead of the train and couldn't be cleared until the work was done, just an idea. Train crews have a blank track warrant form they fill in all the information on. So when the dispatcher says check line 1, track warrant number xxxx is void, line 1 on the form reads:

1. track warrant number _________ is void.

and line 2 would read

2. Proceed from __________ to ___________ on __________ track.

It's kinda like fill in the blank. Just run a search on google for track warrant and you'll see a couple scanned copies out there.

That's all coming from someone who's never worked on a railroad so others may have more accurate info for you.

[Anonymous]

Regarding electronic communication.. dont they use Qualcomm or similar as we did with 18 wheelers? Text messages are much more easier to understand and manage than voice messages. (And recorded too incase a dispute arose)

The train crew in this case can travel 16 miles on that warrant but probably are thinking "Great! we sit." Does the dispatcher take the time to relay information as to "Why" they have to sit after 16 miles?

[Anonymous]

HighIron: Everything transmitted by radio or telephone to or from a train dispatcher is recorded -- and those tapes are replayed if anything goes wrong, believe me!

As for electronic transmission of movement authorities such as warrants, that's coming, I guess. There may be some experimental applications of it already, but nothing widespread on a Class I, yet. But its not the same thing as what truckers receive. I don't know what they get, but I highly doubt that if a trucker doesn't follow them to the letter, that it will result in millions of dollars of wrecked equipment and multiple fatalities, whereas that is precisely what often WILL and DOES happen when railroad movement authorities are disobeyed, ignored, miscopied, or not received. Thus it's critical that the train crew or maintainer read back the authority to the dispatcher before the dispatcher actually grants the authority in the warrant or order or bulletin, so that the dispatcher is assured the person receiving the authority received it with 100% accuracy, every time. It is completely inadequate to just transmit it and hope it got there, or transmit it and hope the train crew understood it. If you listen to a scanner, not until the dispatcher says "OK at XX:XX time, initials," is the authority actually in effect. At that point the dispatcher and train crew have agreed 100% on the content, and then only then is it effective. The computer-aided dispatching systems won't acknowledge and record the authority until that OK is issued. It's fail-safe.

The electronic delivery systems for railroads will have to find some mechanism to verify receipt and understanding, and that will probably continue to be oral. It works very well --don't break what isn't broken.

P.S.: Usually the dispatcher will tell the train crew what's going on. If he knows. If he has time. If he doesn't they'll be bugging him anyway, so he might as well.

OS

[tree68]

The CSX branch I'm near uses "EC1" forms - they used to do NORAC Form D's. Very often they are extending the current authority for the train ("add-on" on the Form D), and just as often, the train hasn't come to the end of their existing authority yet, so the train isn't sitting anyhow. I often hear meets occuring as well.

I often hear the DS put off requests for maintenance/inspection time, even if there are no trains currently on the line.

The CSX dispatcher (at Selkirk) handling this branch is called the "NE". The "ND" dispatcher handles all or part of the CSX "Chicago Line." It's usually the same person.

[Anonymous]

Tree, that dispatcher might have 10 or 20 other line segments he's handling which could be scattered all over that end of the railroad. They are often disconnected from each other and completely unrelated. You'd rarely if ever hear his instructions to trains and maintainers on these other line segments on your scanner, because he's selecting transmission towers appropriate to each radio communication. If you turn all you towers on, all the time, you're going to walk all over everyone on that channel -- including all the maintainers, the guys trying to switch, etc. Not only is that inefficient, it's downright dangerous. Generally the towers have a broadcast range of 10-50 miles, depending on terrain, strength, beam width, etc.

OS

[wayne]

O.S.
None of the situations you site in 3 should apply in the cases I have observed. Because I did not make it clear what I meant by "park it", I think you misunderstood--typically a new warrant will be issued after the train has left the yard in about 10-25 minutes. Also, there is no maintanence going on and the crew has just come on duty and no other trains to meet. Sorry the circumstance wasn't more clearly defined.

[Anonymous]

Wayne, I doubt I can be of more help. While I have familiarity with that territory in a broad sense, I've never worked in or on that specific territory, and I don't know anyone who does at present that I would be comfortable in asking for the purposes of divulging that information. I'm confident they have a good reason for the operating practice you observe. But without knowing the exact situation, I can only provide generalities. I can only tell you that no one parks a train for no reason, and everyone at the railroad is under tremendous pressure -- including loss of their job for very small errors in judgement -- to move traffic and allocate assets as efficiently as possible. From the outside, many things at railroad look inefficient, but the outside view is seldom the big-picture view. There are many times we hold trains for hours, or even days, because moving it forward would lead to much greater costs and problems.

OS

[tree68]

QUOTE: Originally posted by O.S.

Tree, that dispatcher might have 10 or 20 other line segments he's handling which could be scattered all over that end of the railroad. They are often disconnected from each other and completely unrelated. You'd rarely if ever hear his instructions to trains and maintainers on these other line segments on your scanner, because he's selecting transmission towers appropriate to each radio communication. If you turn all you towers on, all the time, you're going to walk all over everyone on that channel -- including all the maintainers, the guys trying to switch, etc. Not only is that inefficient, it's downright dangerous. Generally the towers have a broadcast range of 10-50 miles, depending on terrain, strength, beam width, etc.

OS

Very true on all counts. The only designators I usually hear in my travels are ND and NE. Knowing that that desk is physically located in Selkirk leaves me no doubt that it covers a large portion of New England. The two territories I've mentioned have little to do with each other operationally, other than their junction at Syracuse.

I've heard the local crews move to another channel when they have a lot of chatter and the main is also busy.

[jeffhergert]

QUOTE: Originally posted by wayne

Recently I have overheard(on the scanner) the engineeror conductor asking the dispatcher for a track warrant (this is for leaving Auburn,WA on the Stampede Pass Wye) and the dispatcher said they would have one in 15-20 min. For what reasons would the dispather put them off? Also, is this information transmitted electronically to the train as well as the verbal tranmission? How do the engineers/conductors record all that info so quickly if it is only transmitted verbally? When the track warrant finally came it was for about 16 miles and they were told to park it and wait for another. This is on a line that 2-4 trains daily!!! Any clues???

It sounds like this train is following a track inspector doing a hi-rail inspection. The train has to wait for the inspector to clear his limits before the dispatcher can give the train a warrant. On the UP, MOW forces contact the dispatcher by mobile telephone rather than the regular radio channel. If this is the case, you wouldn't hear the inspector clearing or receiving warrants. Just a guess.
Jeff

[Anonymous]

O.S. I had a laugh when you said that it's easy! How bout when the speaker on the conductor side crapped out and the dispatcher talks like he's got a mouth full of marbles? I normally work in CTC territory although I occasionally get to venture in track warrant areas on the UP and the BN. With a good dispatcher, I'm ok. With Mr. Meally Mouth it can be tough especially if you don't know the territory intimately!! There is one guy that we deal with that if you can't get it right on the third shot, you get kicked off the train! Believe me that the conductor and the engineer are copying the same warrant and reviewing it with each other before the mike button gets pushed! geoff

[Anonymous]

Geoff, you have a point there. Some of the people they're hiring today and allowing to mark up onto a console ... I just don't know.

OS

[Anonymous]

Fun to think about, in a really strange way! Off to bed. Six turns out!

[wayne]

O.S. and others:
Thanks for the responses and I appreciate the help Wayne