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Railroads want one-person crews on freights

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[quote user="Limitedclear"][quote user="futuremodal"][quote user="greyhounds"] The "hard cap" of 15 cars on the Slingshot trains didn't fit the market needs.  [/quote] I'm still not clear on why there had to be a "hard cap" at all.  This was a scheduled train, right?  You leave on the hour whether you have one trailer or 50, because dependability (predictability) of service is what's being sold.  The train leaving with only one trailer is the loss leader for the train that leaves with 50, and your hope is that the shipper will see that schedules are kept regardless of quantity, and thus be more willing to commit to the service.  If over time the single trailer train does not grow, you cut it, because perhaps the time slot just doesn't fit the needs of the shipper.  But you still have to dedicate enough of a time window to see if the service can grow or not. Was there any empirical evidence of the era that suggested a car limit per crew number was credible?  This is what is so vexing regarding these management vs union spats - I can understand the larger fear of de facto labor force reductions if one man crews were implemented systemwide, but when you replace one specific long train with multiple scheduled shorter (usually shorter, but not necessarily) trains, you usually end up with more folks working even with one man crews in the shorter trains.  Six short trains of one man crews employs more people than one long train with four crew members. [/quote] FM, as usual, your ignorance of how railroad employees in the transportation department work shows. What is to stop the railroad from running six LONG trains with one crewmember? Or if they only have enough work for one train, running the single train with one employee? Nothing. The displaced employees will bump to wherever their seniority will allow them to hold at worst the extra board. Perhaps one of them will hold down a utility man's job as backup conductor for the long train. The rest will be furloughed. That is the reality and it is the eventuality that the unions are afraid of. Further, the battle between the BLET and UTU for survival will heat up again as it did with RCL adding additional wrinkles as has been pointed out above. In many places today, running six additional scheduled trains to move existing traffic is simply not possible due to congestion in any event, so the concept isn't workable. Ther real place one man crews have potential is in small low margin local work. For example, some short lines have trains with two engineers and two locomotives that perform certain work and split into two trains at points along their trip to switch separate industries and later reform into a single train for a return trip. Others have used road switchers with a single engineer backed up by a roving conductor/utility man in a vehicle. Where track speeds are low this method can keep the train and its switching moving smoothly to improve customer service. Multiple such trains using one or more utility men could conceivably get customers better service and cut employment. The unions know this and fear it. As the Indiana RR has shown such efforts can ultimately increase employment if carefully managed. It also requires a significant capital investment in RCL technology for locomotives, yard switches and dispatcher interface to make it work. On a small scale it does work and could significantly aid revival or at least preservation of quite a few branchlines and secondary mains. Assuming, of course that the Class 1s can take the additional traffic. LC  [/quote] Oh yes, it's "my" ignorance there mr. caveman. The question isn't predicated on the basic truth that one man can conceivably run a long consist (with an inherent increase in risk).  Rather, the statement more pertains to the concept of the scheduled railroad with ostensibly shorter faster trains, and the subsequent need for more employees to cover the departure array.  The risk to the railroad of running shorter faster scheduled trains is the spector of sharply reduced labor productivity measures if those shorter faster trains require the same number of crewmen as the standard on-call longer slower trains.  Thus, in order for the railroad to mitigate that risk and still offer customers that special service (usually with premium markups) known as flexible departure times, there would have to be union concessions for such variable length scheduled trains to keep labor productivity within range of the current standard.  If the unions aren't willing to negotiate a tiered system to differentiate scheduled railroading from on call railroading, the concept of the shorter faster scheduled train won't work, and that niche market that only railroads can serve will not be. And you know what?  We'll end up with one man crews running long slow consists anyway, while the flexible scheduled concept (where the increase in employment is the union's real pot of gold) will be lost to the ages as the predictable undercapitalization of capacity will be swamped by normal economic demand for rail services.  Remember, there is a correlation among longer and longer trains, subpar industry average velocity, and the ostensible *lack* of current capacity.
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