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[quote user="jeaton"][quote user="futuremodal"][quote user="jeaton"] Even the GAO report notes an uncertainty about the number of captive shippers.  " It is difficult to determine the number of captive shippers,.." [/quote] Difficult?  Sure, if one is too lazy to go out and make a physical count of all the rail shippers who have physical access to only one railroad.  I think if those beauracrats would get off their fat **** and make the physical counts, we'd find actual captive shippers to be much, much more than what the GAO is willing to admit. Memo to GAO:  It's easy to find an actual count of captive rail shippers- any rail shipper with only one physical connection to a Class I rail service provider is captive.  Doesn't matter if they "can" ship by truck or barge, or use multiple modes, or not, or if they can modify production to fit the lack of desired rail service, or not.  Having only one physical connection is captive, period. [/quote] Ah yes, I see it now.  Big fence around the plant with the only gate located where the tracks enter the property, railroad police prohibiting trucks from approaching, phone and data lines going only to the railroad offices, transportation buyer confined to his office.  Maybe that is why one can find so many places where the rail siding has been torn out.  Just got tired of being held captive by the railroad. Your narrow minded defination of captive shipper, i.e. physical connection to only one railroad, could very well cover the vast majority of rail shippers and receivers.  In the matter of making a determination of market dominance, such a defination is about as useless as certain appendages on a boar hog.  Kind of reminds me of the days when the Interstate Commerce Commision thought the only possible competition for one railroad was another railroad. [/quote] Ah yes, I see it now.  If a man can push a wheelbarrow into the plant from an adjacent dirt road, then that represents *competition* for the one Class I connection, thus that plant *is not captive*.  Hey, whatever it takes to keep the monopoly justification rolling along, huh? You always ignore the modal differences that make the rail vs highway vs waterway debate so tangibly unique to each mode. Ergo, the only tangible competition for a railroad is another railroad or two.  10,000 tons of coal are not going to move by highway.  250 containers bi-weekly are not going to move by highway.  A million bushels of grain bought on the market is not going to move by highway. Why?  Because if one tried to do so, they would be shut out of their market - you can bet their competitor isn't moving such tonnage by truck or wheelbarrow. Even carload is a tangible requirement for a firm's survival in this day of global competition for products.  Do you think the plastics plant can survive on truckload delivery alone while the other plastics plants are using carload service? That's the real exemplification of what being a captive rail shipper is all about - survival. It'd be like you running a factory using kerosene lighting while your competitors are using electric lights.  Sure, under your ridiculously broad definition of *competition* the kerosene lights are viable competition for electric lights, yet we all know what will happen if you insist on using kerosene lighting.  Your plant will shut down, your workers laid off, and you will be bankrupt. Which brings us to your other statement, that of the removed siding.  Got news for ya lefty, that siding was removed because (A) the railroad no longer would provide realistic service, and/or (B) the plant could no longer compete with those plants that have better rail rates and services, and thus shut down production or converted to some other (read:  non-rail shipping) production. Not too may server farms and outlet malls need a rail siding these days!
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