Given the financial struggles the railroads are experiencing, I am wondering how long rail bed maintenance can be deferred before it starts impacting service levels.
This question arose when I saw this:
https://www.railpictures.net/photo/743146/
It's amazing what a telephoto lens can do.
Weed spraying is one of the many things that were cancelled during Hunter Harrison's time here. All that growth is from spilled grain, which also attracts wildlife to the tracks.
It is amazing how long you can ride a good physical plant into the ground, CN did it for the better part of 10 years in this area.
That photo is only a few miles west of one of the stretches of double track that Hunter ripped up, and now the National Park won't let CN put it back.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
What does that location appear like now?
You can defer maintenance until there is a bad accident, then you should have done some repair work the week before.
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
kgbw49 Given the financial struggles the railroads are experiencing, I am wondering how long rail bed maintenance can be deferred before it starts impacting service levels. This question arose when I saw this: https://www.railpictures.net/photo/743146/
Amazing, especially when you consider back in the old days a division superintendant would have gotten reamed for letting things get out of control like that.
Nowadays you would get reemed for wasting your budget on "non-essentials".
CN did start running a spray train again last year, and it just passed through this area again a couple weeks ago. It has helped, as will all the new (not as leaky) grain cars that are currently on order, to go along with the ~1000 new cars that are already in service.
Spillage from covered hoppers is fairly minimal when compared to that from boxcars in grain service. Taconite spillage from ore jennies may be hazardous to the conductor's health.
Looks as though they have turned the sleepers into chia pets? Could this be paert of a green solution offering the ties a renewable shield from UV damage?
CSSHEGEWISCHSpillage from covered hoppers is fairly minimal when compared to that from boxcars in grain service. Taconite spillage from ore jennies may be hazardous to the conductor's health.
Taconite spillage is hazardous to any man or animal that tries to walk across the area where the spillage is. Walking on ball bearings !
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
One has to wonder how long the almighty god of lower ORs will mean a bunch of derailments and slow orders ? Worse still lower MAS for passenger trains.
I was startled by a recent look at one of the Train Watcher's Guide to Chicago books recently. Although the roadbeds looked normal to me at the time (1970s), they look terrible to me now! And I can remember in the early 1980s that CNW's track by our commuter station regularly had standing water between the rails. It may take a little while, but I wonder whether UP will emulate that in their efforts to turn an ever-bigger profit.
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
CShaveRRI was startled by a recent look at one of the Train Watcher's Guide to Chicago books recently. Although the roadbeds looked normal to me at the time (1970s), they look terrible to me now! And I can remember in the early 1980s that CNW's track by our commuter station regularly had standing water between the rails. It may take a little while, but I wonder whether UP will emulate that in their efforts to turn an ever-bigger profit.
I concur in your thought processes - viewing the roadbed conditions when I hired out in 1965 and through subsequent years I thought what I was seeing was 1st class --- it wasn't it was deferred maintenance overtaking what once was 1st class.
Subsequent years of profitable operations of my carrier permitted it to raise the level of maintenance to a level one should expect of a Class 1 carrier. PSR I fear is returning the rights of way to the level of disrepair I experienced when I hired out.
kgbw49Given the financial struggles the railroads are experiencing, I am wondering how long rail bed maintenance can be deferred before it starts impacting service levels.
Ask anyone familiar with Penn Central. It can be deferred to significant extent with predictable results. The railroad can be slow-ordered so that trains stall on grades, fail to get over the road during crews' hours of service and derailments become a commonality. At one point during PC years, the Trenton Cut-off was in such bad shape that precipitation caused so many track circuits to be shunted from bad insulated joints that it was found trains made better time operating against the current of traffic with train orders rather than under block signal indication, going from one stop and proceed signal to the next.
The lessons of deferred maintenance have stood up well over the years with (I suggest) a predominance of the track structure kept in very good state. Temptations to cut cost are perhaps more profound than ever, coupled with a seeming lack of willingness to generate traffic. So these temptations may increase, but the ultimate result can be chaotic to operating efficiency and costly to reverse.
BaltACD CShaveRR I concur in your thought processes - viewing the roadbed conditions when I hired out in 1965 and through subsequent years I thought what I was seeing was 1st class --- it wasn't it was deferred maintenance overtaking what once was 1st class. Subsequent years of profitable operations of my carrier permitted it to raise the level of maintenance to a level one should expect of a Class 1 carrier. PSR I fear is returning the rights of way to the level of disrepair I experienced when I hired out.
CShaveRR
Sam, the technical term for that is a "standing derailment". Penn Central had lots of them.
There are not nearly as many grain trains in California as there are in western Canada.
Some crops are genetically modified to be resistant to that most common of herbicides (glyphosate/Roundup), making them harder to kill even when the spray train does show up.
Our yard doesn't seem to be as bad in recent years - I would account that for a lot of newer hoppers that we now have show up. Used to have the bottom of the barrel 50-year hoppers that were being held together by rust and reflective tape.
Guess many of those have hauled their last loads.
It's been fun. But it isn't much fun anymore. Signing off for now.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.t fun any
Former Rock Island cars with 'bankruptcy blue' showing through their later paint are still a regular sight out here (IC and Grand Trunk Western bought lots after the Rock went down). The 'Trudeau' hoppers are just as old.
CN has a total of 2500 new high-capacity grain hoppers either in service or on order, CP is also in the process of replacing their fleet. Many grain companies are also acquiring their own fleets of brand new cars.
Some of those old Rock Island hoppers showed up here a few years ago, kind of a shock if you knew what you were looking at. Typically the oldest rolling stock observed were Southern Railway boxcars with the "Southern Serves The South" logo. You darn well knew they hadn't seen a paint shop in decades!
Deferred maintanance? Well there is the old saying, "Pay now, or pay later!" Cars, buildings, or railroads, it will catch up with you eventually.
I note that this picture is from 2011, not long after CN had gotten rid of EHH. I have many pictures taken by Tim Stevens at Henry House and the track looks just fine. Try finding Tim's picture of ET44AC 3285 on Railpictures or any of the many fine pictures he has from around Jasper AB.
Roger that it was a 2011 picture.
The original post was just a question for discussion.
Although this is unlikely - have to ask. Could the bridge derailment at Tempte Wedensday and the other one also there June 26 have been due to deferred maintenance ?
Steve:My wife and I were out to Colorado a few years ago and spent one night in Paonia - just east of Delta. The rail line looked great. I asked the B&B operator about trains running thru and she erupted into a dissertation about the evil of coal mines and fires burning underground an how the world was coming to an end. I changed subjects and inquired where we should eat dinner...
Anyway, the next morning I hear a train and attempted to get in front of it for a photo...no such luck as it was moving at about 40mph.
Question - how often are coal trains loaded on that line?
That is a great part of Colorado. Really pretty valley and a couple of nice wineries.
I also got into quite a discussion on "water rights" - we never have that issue here in Indiana.
BTW, we ate at the Hightower Cafe in Paonia where my wife had excellent rainbow trout...my pastromi rueben was pretty good also. Would love to return. Maybe next year if COVID cooperates.
ed
MP173 Steve:My wife and I were out to Colorado a few years ago and spent one night in Paonia - just east of Delta. The rail line looked great. I asked the B&B operator about trains running thru and she erupted into a dissertation about the evil of coal mines and fires burning underground an how the world was coming to an end. I changed subjects and inquired where we should eat dinner... Anyway, the next morning I hear a train and attempted to get in front of it for a photo...no such luck as it was moving at about 40mph. Question - how often are coal trains loaded on that line? That is a great part of Colorado. Really pretty valley and a couple of nice wineries. I also got into quite a discussion on "water rights" - we never have that issue here in Indiana. BTW, we ate at the Hightower Cafe in Paonia where my wife had excellent rainbow trout...my pastromi rueben was pretty good also. Would love to return. Maybe next year if COVID cooperates. ed
Back in 2004-2007 my one daughter and her family lived in Fernly, NV while her husband was stationed at the Fallon Naval Air Station about 30 miles away. The Fallon branch of the UP from Hazen had a daily round trip (and a good amount of business) on a line that the speed limit was also 10 MPH. Fom Hazen until near Fallon the line was so bad the cars were definitely "rocken and rollin" everytime I saw them. It was amazing to me that they stayed on the track.
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