How long can a railroad leave unloaded rail cars at an industry?
Forever if they want.
If it is not a car owned by the railroad (private owner other than the industry on the track or is owned by a different railroad), the railroad owning the track will pay "car hire" or "per diem" (an hourly or daily charge) to the owner of the car. Usually runs a few cents per hour (depends on car type, owner and era). If the car is owned by the railroad, leased by the railroad, or is owned or leased by the industry served by the track, there isn't a charge.
Conceiveably they could leave the car there long enough to abandon the track or switch connected to the industry.
Typically a car stays there empty until the next train that services the industry runs. Typically a shift, a day, a couple days or maybe a week, depending on how often the industry is serviced.
Sometimes in the modern eras there might be some sort of requirement in the service contract to pull cars within a certain time frame, but that generally is done for loads, not empties.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
dehusman Forever if they want. If it is not a car owned by the railroad (private owner other than the industry on the track or is owned by a different railroad), the railroad owning the track will pay "car hire" or "per diem" (an hourly or daily charge) to the owner of the car. Usually runs a few cents per hour (depends on car type, owner and era). If the car is owned by the railroad, leased by the railroad, or is owned or leased by the industry served by the track, there isn't a charge. Conceiveably they could leave the car there long enough to abandon the track or switch connected to the industry. Typically a car stays there empty until the next train that services the industry runs. Typically a shift, a day, a couple days or maybe a week, depending on how often the industry is serviced. Sometimes in the modern eras there might be some sort of requirement in the service contract to pull cars within a certain time frame, but that generally is done for loads, not empties.
Back in the Day.....Per Diem charges were based on the location of a car at midnight - so you had to pay one day's per diem for every car on your line as of the witching hour.
1) This led to the custom of "the midnight shove", with the yardmaster gathering as many MT's as possible late in evening and running a transfer run to the yard of a connecting line to get them off the property by midnight. Of course two could play that game and the dispatchers, towermen and yardmasters of that line would throw every impediment they could dream up to stall your train, while you did the same to their "shove"
2) At the end of the month an summary for each month was sent to a central clearing house and each line's charges were totalled up. So line X might owe line Y $50,000, BUT you might owe them $49,000. The bills were netted against each other so little cash actually changed hands.
3) The exception was when a line was in bankruptcy (which DOES not mean operations cease, it's a way for its finances to be arranged so that (hopefully) it emerges as a proftable entity). The fly in the ointment is that the bankrupt line no longer had to pay per diem. In Penn Central's case, with its huge number of cars, that meant the per diem charges each connecting railroad had to pay it headed into the stratosphere as the mutual charges were no longer in balance. This helped drag some of the other lines in the Northeast down with it, as they had to go bankrupt in self defence.
BEAUSABREBack in the Day.....Per Diem charges were based on the location of a car at midnight - so you had to pay one day's per diem for every car on your line as of the witching hour.
Adding a little technicolor. It being a railroad thing, it ends up horribly complicated. Per diem or car hire (same thing) was paid to the car owner. If the car was owned by the railroad itself, there is no per diem charge. A PRR car on the PRR acrues no per diem. An ATSF car leased by the PRR on the PRR accrues no per diem. A bad order car on the PRR accrues no per diem.
Per diem was not paid on private cars on private tracks and were often paid on a mileage basis. A DUPX car on spot on an industry spur would not acrue per diem, but one in a train or pulled into a railroad yard would.
Certain railroad owned reefers and tank cars were paid on a mileage basis instead of a daily or hourly basis (such as SFRD cars). It didn't matter where they were.
At some point in the late 1970's or early 1980's per diem was changed to an hourly instead of daily basis, that ended the whole get there by midnight thing. Car hire charges varied based on the value of the car and it's age. In the 1970's that could be anything from a minimum of $1 a day for a 30+ year old car worth $1000 to $45 dollars a day for a brand new car that was worth $150,000 (the car not the shipment).
Additionally interchange ends when the car is placed on the interchange track (or "offered" for interchange). Railroads have agreed on what track or tracks, could be one track or one track in a yard or it could be multiple tracks or even anywhere in an entire yard, depends on the agreement. It can also be a point, when a tcar passed the west switch at a point, it is interchanged. If track 10 is the designated interchange track from railroad ABC to railroad DEF, when a car is placed in track 10, it is considered "interchanged" and it goes into DEF's account.
If the interchange track is full and DEF hasn't pulled it or if DEF refuses to take the interchange delivery from ABC, then ABC can acculmulate the DEF cars and "offer" them to DEF, by making an "offering report" and they will go into DEF's car hire account, even though the cars are not on the interchange track and could be miles from the interchange.
During one of the congested periods in the 1990's, the VP's were hot and heavy on making offering reports on interchange trains that were intermodal, automotive and unit grain or coal trains that were being refused. I did some research and found all that equipment was on a mileage agreement or exempt from car hire, so offering reports were moot.
Another thing to consider is how long the industry has to unload a received shipment.
Forty years ago, GMC started paying per diem charges 48 hours after the car arrived.
This only ever happened at Christmas break, and summer shutdown. GM would get lifttruck drivers to work fours overtime to unload cars after the last pre Christmas shift, because that was cheaper than the per diem for 8-10 day shutdown.
davidmurray Another thing to consider is how long the industry has to unload a received shipment. Forty years ago, GMC started paying per diem charges 48 hours after the car arrived. This only ever happened at Christmas break, and summer shutdown. GM would get lifttruck drivers to work fours overtime to unload cars after the last pre Christmas shift, because that was cheaper than the per diem for 8-10 day shutdown.
That's kind of a second question.
How long does an industry have to load/unload a car?
How long does a railroad have to pick the car up after the industry "releases" it?
While they add together to impact how long a car sits at an industry, it's two questions.
Again there is a difference between shipper owned/leased cars and railroad owned cars.
If the car is owned and provided by a railroad, the RR starts charging "demurrage" to the industry after 2 days from initial placement.
If the car is privately owned, there are no charges to be paid to the railroad.
Chris van der Heide
My Algoma Central Railway Modeling Blog
cv_acrHow long does a railroad have to pick the car up after the industry "releases" it?
There is no set time. The vast majority of the time there is no penalty on the railroad not pulling the car, regardless of whether the car is loaded or empty. If a railroad isn't concerned about the per diem, if per diem is being charged, they can leave the car there for days, weeks, months.
The most amazing thing about this topic is it was done with pencils and paper as computers did not exist. There are pictures of the PRR car tracking department in New York where several women sat around circular desks which had a lazy Susan and massive binders with every car the PRR had. They entered the info for every car in the system as info from the field was sent in