QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal And utilities are charged with providing their service to both urban and rural customers. If the electric utilities behaved like the Class I's, they'd stop service to rural customers and focus soley on urban customers, because the maintenance costs of serving rural customers are higher than those for serving denser populations. This idea of railroads being just like any other business is ridiculous.
QUOTE: Originally posted by CSSHEGEWISCH That sort of contracting out would be difficult to impossible under current union contracts. BN had a long dispute with the International Association of Machinists regarding contracting out of shopwork on the Oakway SD60's and LMX B39-8's.
QUOTE: Originally posted by andrewjonathon The problem with comparing the customers that a shortline, such as WSOR, will serve with the customers a Class 1 like CN will serve is that shortlines have a very different cost structure. What may be a money loser for CN may very well be profitable for a shortline like WSOR. Maybe Class 1's should consider contracting out online switching to shortlines similar to how airlines contract out food preparation and airline maintenance etc.
QUOTE: Originally posted by macguy I suppose with all of this large railway consolidation we really are seeing more and more regionals popping up, and in all that's really a better situation. Though we lose some railways, other smaller ones are gained, and what's most important is that no matter who is serving the customer, the customer IS being served BY RAIL, is happy, and rail cars are moving back and forth. Perhaps with BC Rail now a memory, we will start to see a few shortlines pop up in Nothern British Columbia, picking up the slack where CN has either given up or doesn't care.
QUOTE: Originally posted by CSSHEGEWISCH Keep in mind that if land grants, both federal and state, did not exist, it is quite probable that it would have taken a lot longer for most Western railroads to be built. Also, the Great Northern Railway was built without any land grants. I find it amazing to find that people still use the land-grant issue as a reason to justify the forced continuance of unprofitable services,.
QUOTE: Originally posted by jchnhtfd Kindly relax and get over it. CN is a multinational, publicly held corporation. As such, it is in business to make money using capital assets. This it does, exceedlingly well. CN is NOT, repeat NOT, in the business of providing a social service, nor is any other private corporation, either in Canada or the United States (or the United Kingdom, for that matter). If the people of British Columbia (or Wisconsin, for that matter) want to have more rail service, or different rail service, it is not difficult to do: pass appropriate legislation to provide appropriate subsidies to the relevant railroad. For reasons which I completely fail to understand, there seems to be a commonly held notion that somehow railroads should be public servants, unlike any other private corporation -- but that notion does not seem to extend to providing the money to perform the public services (see the debates over Amtrak in the US, for instance).
QUOTE: Originally posted by jchnhtfd but refuse to pony up the ca***o support the service, and that this attitude seems to be confined to railroads. Can anyone explain this?
QUOTE: Originally posted by nanaimo73 Is it a government's job to run freight trains? I don't think so. BC Rail lost money during 4 of it's last 5 years.Why should a load of lumber from MacKenzie going to Chicago have to go through Vancouver? It's at least 6 days faster going through PG.The Premier may be an a--h--- but he is going to put 500,000 containers a year through Prince Rupert.
QUOTE: Originally posted by nanaimo73 Canada isn't all bad. We have fresh air and water.And we invented Pamela Anderson and Ditch Lights.[:D][:D]
QUOTE: Originally posted by tatans Say, how long have you lived in Canada, 1 airline, 1 big brewery, a couple of banks(soon to be 2) no railway passenger service etc. etc. We really do hate competiton don't we? and , by the way, have you noticed, no one cares.
QUOTE: Originally posted by greyhounds I think "You Canadian Types" left out Your most important thingy; The National Hockey League is Shut Down, and no one cares. The last time I went to a Black Hawks game, trying to impress a new date who was for some reason: 1) from the Detroit area, and 2) a very major Red Wings fan, It cost me $60 a ticket. I ain't paying $120 to take a woman to a hockey game! Plus dinner! And parking. Did it once. Don't want to do it again.
QUOTE: Originally posted by Junctionfan Take it to a Transport Canada type agency that regulates service. Unlike Wisconsin and other U.S states, Canada does have something to tell CN to perform the service or find the industry an alternative. Also if CN and the industries have signed a contract saying that CN has to perform a service in exchange for something else, as long as the industries are living up to their end of the contract, CN could be sued for breach of contract. There are other class 1s in Vancouver. CP is the biggest alternative. BNSF also enters the city. SRY is a shortline that is a Rail link subsidiary and must be able to aquire running rights so I don't really see too much of a problem in B.C.
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