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[quote user="kenneo"] Article from Oregon Public Broadcasting concerning Quincy, Washington, and the BNSF.  Quincy is just a bit East of Wenatchie at the top of the grade up from the Columbia River.FM ---- Open Access in Action?<a href="http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/opb/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1096928">http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/opb/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1096928</a> [/quote]Open access would certain mitigate the situation, but the Port of Quincy folks should have known they were dealing with an entity that is not to be trusted with public funds or public commitments.  Although this particular story goes way deeper than what was opined - way back to the day when I was involved with Columbia Rail Intermodal and RailRunner trying to facilitate the Yakima to Puget Sound single stack service.CRI was initially the LLC that approached the Port of Quincy about establishing a rail intermodal terminal for Puget Sound bound containers.  CRI saw that there was more than enough export containers of Central Washington ag products heading by truck over Snoqualmie Pass to try and shift that traffic to rail.  What they envisioned was for certain westbound BNSF container trains to stop off at Quincy, offload the empty containers fit for ag products (of which most westbound container trains have plenty of, empty containers that is), and throw on containers subsequently filled with Central Washington ag products.  The concept made sense, and the premium pricing demanded by BNSF was still light years less costly than trucking the containers via the Interstate.It seemed like a go.  The Port of Quincy and CRI even signed agreements in principle for the collaberation.Then Northwest Container Services stepped in, and seeing the same possibilities, made a counteroffer to the Port.  The Port of Quincy subsequently opted out of the CRI agreements and opted in with NCS instead.  CRI then brought litigation into the mix, since they had already invested a lot of money for the Quincy operation.  CRI in the meantime decided to operate out of nearby Wenatchee, and ran a fairly successful operation using the same principles of off-loading empty containers and on-loading full containers while the trains were stopped for crew change or whatever reason it is that BNSF trains will stop in Wenatchee.However, BNSF over the last year or so eventually decided to end the CRI service out of Wenatchee, and CRI has subsequently gone out of business (or changed to other venues, I'm not sure - haven't been able to contact David via the old numbers he gave me).  No one really knows why, it was making money for all the entities involved, but that's BNSF for you.  This was just a few years after BNSF rejected the RailRunner concept out of Yakima, another brilliant concept[;)] that would take trucks off the roads and bring in revenue over underutilized trackage via Stampede Pass.This goes right to the heart of my opinion that BNSF is simply not interested in providing decent service to domestic customers, even though those same domestic customers are willing to pay a higher rate (and incur most of the investment risk!) than what BNSF is getting from the Asian importers.  Why this is so is open to speculation, and I have done more than enough speculatin' about BNSF's "prime directive".  I'll let others provide the defense of this company if they want to prove me wrong (John B.?)It should be noted that Northwest Container continues to operate a short haul intermodal service out of Pasco Washington, albeit with UP, not BNSF.Perhaps the Port of Quincy is getting their come-uppance for what they did to CRI, but that is more in the karma mode than any legal recompense.  The fact is the Port apparently screwed up in not getting firm contractual agreements from BNSF, ones that could be acted on should BNSF try to delay or pull out of the deal.
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