Railway Man All due respect but I do not share that opinion (that the consequences of 286K are being discounted or ignored). But we were not talking about 263K vs. 286K, we were talking about 12 more MGT/year?
We are, and I'm just pointing out that whether that 12 MGT is in 263K or 286K cars on 4 axles makes a significant difference in the wear-and-tear effect on the track, and whether that causes the track maintenance costs to rise more than just the mere pro rata increase in same from 12 more MGT (this in the context of the broader question by you of whether "only a pro-rata increase in maintenance is not overmaintained and overinfrastructured"). From your response, I now understand that those consequences are indeed considered by managements, so that concludes the point.
Railway Man Paul, do you really think I would make a general point based only on narrow regional experience? How do you know where the people I work with come from or what their experience is? I wouldn't do you like that if I thought their experiences were circumscribed. This isn't a debating society where I'm trying to score points. I'm only here to pass on what I think is useful knowledge. If it's knowledge that's contingent or narrow, I make sure I say so so the reader can consider the source. If it's knowledge no one wants, say so, and I'll do something else for fun.
Paul, do you really think I would make a general point based only on narrow regional experience? How do you know where the people I work with come from or what their experience is? I wouldn't do you like that if I thought their experiences were circumscribed. This isn't a debating society where I'm trying to score points. I'm only here to pass on what I think is useful knowledge. If it's knowledge that's contingent or narrow, I make sure I say so so the reader can consider the source. If it's knowledge no one wants, say so, and I'll do something else for fun.
So sorry to have given you that impression, because: No, I don't really think that - in fact, just the opposite - that it's my experience that is parochial. Of course I don't know anything about your colleagues, except that your individual and collective expertise is surely more than mine. But my experience is not trivial, and I was asking myself why rational and intelligent people are coming out so far apart on essentially the same technical question - where's the difference in facts, analysis, intuition, background, bias (can you tell I'm sensitive about 286K cars ?), etc. What I concluded is that it's probably my experience in a mainly PRR-influenced environment - you know, "The Standard Railroad of the World !" - that is the narrow experience, as I set forth above. I thought that insight into what influenced me and my background was worth sharing to explain, understand, and justify the differing engineering conclusions that are being reached here on this issue, and how they perhaps could be simultaneously valid (or not). Like you - so the reader can consider the source. And something I thought of over lunch to illustrate a little further: The 115 RE rail section never really caught on out here "back in the day" (although the transit agencies have pretty much adopted it over the last 20 - 30 years). By the time it came along, all the important lines here already had 130 lb. or larger. That's a statement that can't be made about a lot of trackage in the US, ergo it is not of general application. It does, however, illustrate where I'm coming from on this - and no disrespect at all is intended.
Paul, you've built a strawman case. What about the line with 90 MGT? How about 70 MGT? How about 50 MGT? But regardless, I can think of lines with 100-130 MGT where sticking two more heavy trains on them a day are going to have rather expensive consequences, because we've been going through that exercise lately. Where I part ways is the statement that this is usually possible. I wouldn't make that claim without knowing the specific line we're talking about.
Perhaps I have gotten too involved with this strawman case - unwittingly - and that's why I didn't want to go too far down this "ancillary to a sidetrack to the main point of this thread" in the first place, as I said above when I started my response. But that point was too troubling to me to let pass unchallenged (perhaps a poor judgment call on my part). We agree that imposing anything near the traffic volume that might result from this traffic source on a long-term basis - from 11 to 72 trains per day, one-way, per my calcs above - is going to require huge improvements in all aspects of the infrastructure. I'd much rather discuss that challenge and the other valid points you've raised above, than get bogged down in an arcane and moot debate over the effect of a mere 2 or 3 trains per day.
Yes, it is tracked that closely and budgeted that closely. No one is going to sit there passively in the engineering department and let 12 MGT a year onto their territory without coming back with the specific budget increase it will take to accommodate it, and no one in the marketing department is going to just sit there passively and take that kind of a hit to their pricing structure without seeing the numbers. Good Lord, Paul, we're the kind of people who argue with our Excel charts about whether a turnout off a minor main line to an industrial spur should be #15 to save on track maintenance cost or #9 to save on labor to grease it so the brakeman doesn't throw his back out and file an injury claim.
I'm not discussing marketing or pricing at all - concur on that; just the track maintenance / engineering budget aspects. I'm also not saying that added 12 MGT should be a "freebie" - just trying to better understand basis for arriving at "the specific budget increase it will take to accommodate it", to wit: Should the added maintenance budget be arrived at by using $X per additional MGT, or $Y per added MGT ? If it's $X on a straight-line basis, no problem - we're agreed, let's go home. But if it's $Y instead - and the $Y coefficient is significantly higher than $X for just 12 MGT more - well, OK, then the questions I'm asking in good-faith curiosity are, "Is that really so ?" "And why is that happening ?" And now I see you've addressed that below. [You edited this while I was responding to it, right ? ]
Somewhere I think the two of us got a bit tangled up on whether we were talking the specific case or the general. To recap where I'm at, I'm arguing the general case. In general, I am skeptical that the general rail line in the U.S., in normal economic times (which means normal traffic) can take 12 more MGT a year, and the engineering department saying "no problem, just an "x" percent increase in our costs based on the proportion increase to the existing MGT." Because the moment they say that, everyone is going to start doubting their veracity on every budget they publish. Sure, I can find specific lines that can take it, but those were already overbuilt for their current tonnage. RWM
RWM
Yes, we have gotten tangled up - see above. I now see where you're coming from on the general case proposition, i.e., that we can't say as a blanket statement that all rail lines in the US can take 12 MGT more annually with only a proportional increase in the engineering costs, even though I can point to a few around here that could, and I don't think those are overbuilt (those are likely the "exceptions that prove the rule"). But the veracity problem you refer to above isn't engineering, it isn't budgetary - it's institutional and administrative, and that's different. As you've noted before in another thread, people hate shades of gray, and too often engineering loses out on determinations that turn on those nuances. So I can see why engineering depts. are gun-shy of giving up the ability to claim a share of the new revenues to be allocated for extra costs for changes in baseload traffic volumes - and more power to them - but the administrative and budgetary battles don't determine what's actually happening out on the track.
Well, enough for one day. Thanks for participating in the extended debate discussion - it does sharpen the mind, and I trust you won't go and find something else to do for fun instead, because I really want to get back to your other points soon. Meanwhile, best wishes for a great weekend !
- Paul North.
There was an article in the Toronto Globe and Mail last July saying CN was going to be hauling an increasing amount of petroleum coke from the oil sands down to Edmonton and then west to Prince Rupert for export. I believe the forcast was to exceed 10 million tonnes/year.
nanaimo73There was an article in the Toronto Globe and Mail last July saying CN was going to be hauling an increasing amount of petroleum coke from the oil sands down to Edmonton and then west to Prince Rupert for export. I believe the forcast was to exceed 10 million tonnes/year.
There's a mountain of the stuff sitting there in Alberta as a byproduct of the refining process. A number of U.S. customers have looked at it as a substitute for oil, coal, or natural gas. My last look-see was in October. The rail rates have not yet been competitive with U.S. coal.
That kind of tells me that a rail rate for the oil itself wouldn't be competitive with other oil sources, either.
sparky3I have heard it estimated that the upgrade of the line to the standards that would be required for day to day use of this type would be in the neighborhood of 1 billion dollars.
I don't know who his sources are but I don't think they're kidding. I've looked at the SPV Railroad Atlas for Western Canada and the 2007 Canadian Trackside Guide and the rail line from Fort McMurray right to Edmonton is a rail line with issues.
When you look at the atlas you cannot believe the number of named and unnamed bodies of water surrounding the old AN portion of the route. It hardly seems possible that the original A&GWR guys were able to find a strip of dry land for a ROW. And then there is the issue of sidings. They range from a length of 1380' to a whopping 2620' until you are right outside of Edmonton. There is a stretch of about 75 miles with Lac La Biche near the middle, that has only one siding 8.1 miles east of Lac La Biche that is a whole 1600' long. This problem seems to be mitigated somewhat by Lac La Biche having a yard, and knowing the size of that town, I use the term advisedly. I suppose the extra trackage would allow you to split a train for a meet. I'm wondering if this stretch is where the muskeg is.
Having read the original article that inspired this thread for a third time now, I cannot believe that the plan it refers to isn't actually some sort of position paper to base a request for government infrastructure money on, or as RWM suggests, a basis for a serious rise in shipping rates. But with a line like this, how do you increase service without a huge lag time before you can collect the higher rates?
AgentKid
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
Is/was this line maintained over the years? Who would of thought a line to Ft.Mac. would ever exist? what was the incentive, beaver pelts?, bitumen to fix your canoe? What would entice anyone to construct a line to nowhere? remember the Alaska highway? when you drive it a lot of fill under the highway consists of highway construction vehicles, many tales of guys jumping off bulldozers as they sunk out of sight, this is the type of terrain around Ft. Mac.
tatans Is/was this line maintained over the years? Who would of thought a line to Ft.Mac. would ever exist? what was the incentive, beaver pelts?, bitumen to fix your canoe? What would entice anyone to construct a line to nowhere? remember the Alaska highway? when you drive it a lot of fill under the highway consists of highway construction vehicles, many tales of guys jumping off bulldozers as they sunk out of sight, this is the type of terrain around Ft. Mac.
This website is informative-
http://railways-atlas.tapor.ualberta.ca/cocoon/atlas/Chapters-11-6/
nanaimo73what was the incentive, beaver pelts?
Like I mentioned in my first post in this thread, Waterways/Fort McMurray was the loading point for barges running up the Athabasca and Mackenzie River's to serve First Nation's and white resource hunting communities right up to the Arctic Ocean before the era of the DeHavilland Otter.
nanaimo73Is/was this line maintained over the years?
Based on what I found researching the post I made this morning; maintained? sort of, upgraded? not so much.
AgentKid nanaimo73what was the incentive, beaver pelts? Like I mentioned in my first post in this thread, Waterways/Fort McMurray was the loading point for barges running up the Athabasca and Mackenzie River's to serve First Nation's and white resource hunting communities right up to the Arctic Ocean before the era of the DeHavilland Otter. nanaimo73Is/was this line maintained over the years? Based on what I found researching the post I made this morning; maintained? sort of, upgraded? not so much. AgentKid
I didn't ask either of those questions.
My apologies. It was tatans who asked these questions.
AgentKidIn a TRAINS or CLASSIC TRAINS article within the last year or so there was a story about a man who took a round trip up there in about 1960.
While watching Curling on CBC.ca, I located the article I mentioned above. It is "Mixed Train Through The Muskeg" in the Fall 2007 edition of CLASSIC TRAINS page 80.
Since the line was originally built, much has been learned about soils engineering, construction over muskeg and in permafrost areas, and new materials, equipment, and techniques developed to cope with them, etc. - "Cold Weather Regions Engineering" is the term often used. This knowledge came from projects such as the Alasaka Highway, the Alaska Oil Pipeline, the oil exploration on the North Slope, and the tar sands projects themselves. Some of the methods used include first installing thick layers of gravel (and/ or insulation) to keep the permafrost from thawing in the summer, excavating and replaacing the muskeg with gravel, the geotechnical "filter fabrics" of various kinds, soil stabilization with bentonite, lime, cement, confinement, sheet pilings, etc. As long as the ground is (or can be made) to support a mostly uniform short-term load over a broad area - as in while a train passes over it - on the order of 1,000 lbs. per sq. ft. (6 PSI) at a depth from 3 to 5 feet below the surface without significant settlement, this can be done, albeit at some considerable expense.
In view of that, the past experience on this line is not a valid predictor of specific future problems - only that the underlying geotechnical challenges are still there, and will have to be addressed with the modern methods (which will undoubtedly then present their own set of problems . . . ).
Railway ManPaul_D_North_Jr - 200 cars a day is one thing; that they're 286K cars is quite another thing (that detail wasn't in your earlier post). But that does change my initial response to the comment. It's long been known that 286K cars (and by extension, 315K cars) are disproportionately harder on the track than 263K cars that I referenced earlier - but no one on the executive floor (or the operating or marketing floors, either) wants to hear that, or more importantly, budget the appropriate $ and track time to fix up the additional wear-and-tear that the heavier cars cause - so why bother ? But I do concur with the 12MGT/ year figure - actually, I got closer to 14 MGT; [para. snipped] All due respect but I do not share that opinion (that the consequences of 286K are being discounted or ignored). But we were not talking about 263K vs. 286K, we were talking about 12 more MGT/year? [paras. snipped] Yes, it is tracked that closely and budgeted that closely. No one is going to sit there passively in the engineering department and let 12 MGT a year onto their territory without coming back with the specific budget increase it will take to accommodate it, . . . .[snip] . . . To recap where I'm at, I'm arguing the general case. In general, I am skeptical that the general rail line in the U.S., in normal economic times (which means normal traffic) can take 12 more MGT a year, and the engineering department saying "no problem, just an "x" percent increase in our costs based on the proportion increase to the existing MGT." Because the moment they say that, everyone is going to start doubting their veracity on every budget they publish. [snip] RWM
Paul_D_North_Jr - 200 cars a day is one thing; that they're 286K cars is quite another thing (that detail wasn't in your earlier post). But that does change my initial response to the comment. It's long been known that 286K cars (and by extension, 315K cars) are disproportionately harder on the track than 263K cars that I referenced earlier - but no one on the executive floor (or the operating or marketing floors, either) wants to hear that, or more importantly, budget the appropriate $ and track time to fix up the additional wear-and-tear that the heavier cars cause - so why bother ? But I do concur with the 12MGT/ year figure - actually, I got closer to 14 MGT; [para. snipped]
- 200 cars a day is one thing; that they're 286K cars is quite another thing (that detail wasn't in your earlier post). But that does change my initial response to the comment. It's long been known that 286K cars (and by extension, 315K cars) are disproportionately harder on the track than 263K cars that I referenced earlier - but no one on the executive floor (or the operating or marketing floors, either) wants to hear that, or more importantly, budget the appropriate $ and track time to fix up the additional wear-and-tear that the heavier cars cause - so why bother ? But I do concur with the 12MGT/ year figure - actually, I got closer to 14 MGT; [para. snipped]
All due respect but I do not share that opinion (that the consequences of 286K are being discounted or ignored). But we were not talking about 263K vs. 286K, we were talking about 12 more MGT/year?
[paras. snipped]
Yes, it is tracked that closely and budgeted that closely. No one is going to sit there passively in the engineering department and let 12 MGT a year onto their territory without coming back with the specific budget increase it will take to accommodate it, . . . .[snip] . . . To recap where I'm at, I'm arguing the general case. In general, I am skeptical that the general rail line in the U.S., in normal economic times (which means normal traffic) can take 12 more MGT a year, and the engineering department saying "no problem, just an "x" percent increase in our costs based on the proportion increase to the existing MGT." Because the moment they say that, everyone is going to start doubting their veracity on every budget they publish. [snip]
[emphasis added - PDN.]
Question (and let me be clear about this - with respect): Are the emphasized portions above consistent, with regard to whether the Engineering Department's view of the economics of certain matters are given credence by the operating, marketing, and executive levels ?
Or, do these statements instead reflect the positions of different personnel at different places - and with different functions - in the organization ? Specifically, is the Engineering Dept. is expected to advocate (within reasonable limits) for their legitimate needs ? And, are those needs indeed taken into account by the executive levels - such that if "that dog doesn't bark", then the executives begin to wonder if the engineers have been "crying wolf" ? (to mix the metaphors)
Not trying to back you into a corner here - just trying to harmonize what at first seem to be conflicting statements, for a better understanding of contemporary railroad management dynamics and processes.
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