UP Breakdown

[Anonymous]

Found this on another forum.

QUOTE:
We're a great big rollin' railroad
One that everyone can see
'Cause we're Usually Parked on sidings
That's why we're called U.P.

We're a million tons of cargo
Just a rottin' in the sun
We're the Union Pacific
And our meltdown's just begun

From the plugged up yard in Roseville
To our mainline filled with cars
It's a big congested mess
Like a railroad version of SARS

We're a thousand wheels of freight train
All being held for power
We're the Union Pacific
Makin' half a mile an hour

Bound from Omaha to Portland
Our customers are in luck
'Cause we're setting out their cargos
To load it all on trucks

With Amtrak stuck in Oakland
And in Denver and L.A.
We're the Union Pacific
And you're not gonna move today

From the Valley to Dunsmuir
We are runnin' out of crews
But we'll deliver your great cargo
'Cause we're usin' DPU's

We're much safer and efficient
All thanks to remote control
We're the Union Pacifc
Our bean counters say it's so

With our copyrighted emblem
We're gonna make 'em bleed
And the beatings will continue
'Til our tired crews succeed

Our investors are all waiting
With the shippers on their knees
We're the Union Pacific
And we'll deliver when we please...

[tree68]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jruppert

I have to say first that I do not know much about the business of railroading, and I wish I knew more and maybe in time I will.

On the surface, it seems that with ever increasing focus on unit trains and container frieght, the major railroads have less time for smaller customers.

Maybe a solution would be to separate this type of business from the rest of rail service; a kind of privately run Amtrak for container traffic. This would be analogus to the breakup of Bell telephone, where the service provider is a separate business from the infrastructure owner.

That's pretty much what has been happening - witness all the spinoff shortlines that have cropped up. Switching small local industries is time consuming and expensive. Linehauling unit trains has a much higher rate of return. We can probably blame those money grubbing bean counters for some of that - if a line isn't making money - let it go. Never mind that the line is part of what generates the mainline traffic that does make money. The phenomenon is neither new, nor solely a UP activity.

[Anonymous]

Things seem to be getting a little better. Intermodal departures out of City of Industry were running 12-24hr late, and 72 hours out of LATC just two weeks ago. This week they're pretty much on time. They're still running behind at their destination ramps or junctions, but maybe 12-24 hours late instead of a couple of days.

[Anonymous]

Clemente's answer just shows to me that this kitchen is too hot for me! I'm gonna take a break and just open my ears until I learn a thing or two.

[Anonymous]

I'll bet they're singing the lyrics to Tom Petty's song "Break down" in the BNSF head quarters right now...

Breakdown, go ahead and give it to me
Breakdown, take me through the night
Breakdown, go ahead give it to me,
Breakdown, it's alright,
It's alright, it's alright

[Anonymous]

It was suggested earlier in this thread that UP should reopen the west half of its Phoenix Line as a relief valve. Nobody would love to see this more than me, but here's the reality. Phoenix to Wellton is ABS/DTC with mostly jointed rail, and had lower track speed than Gila Line. It would take a major investment to make the entire PHX Line (Picacho-PHX-Wellton) as good as the Gila Line, and that money would be better spent linking up the sidings on the Gila Line between Picacho and Wellton. Sure would be nice to see those semaphores west of PHX kicked into action again, though.

[Anonymous]

I just read Paul Milenkovic over on "Is it me or....." and I guess he makes a lot of sense what he is saying about the UP's taking over other lines.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jruppert

Maybe not. But who buys stock in large american companies?
- Foreign conglomerates.

Another gross over generalization. If you examine most large corporate shareholder books you'll find many more retirement funds, mutual funds, insurance companies and individuals than you will foreign conglomerates as shareholders.

LC

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jruppert

I also firmly believe taxes are the reason companies are moving to other countries. The common complaint is that cheap labor is the reason. Are taxes too high? Probably not, but this is just another way to cut a corner and keep the balance sheet looking good to investors.

Sorry, but this is a GROSS oversimplification of the many factors (including costs of labor, materials, production, management and transportation and others in addition to taxes and other government related costs) that go into a decision to move or outsource corporate facilities.

LC

[Anonymous]

espee foamer has it right on--too big, too far out of touch. No doubt.

[Anonymous]

I have to say first that I do not know much about the business of railroading, and I wish I knew more and maybe in time I will.

On the surface, it seems that with ever increasing focus on unit trains and container frieght, the major railroads have less time for smaller customers.

Maybe a solution would be to separate this type of business from the rest of rail service; a kind of privately run Amtrack for container traffic. This would be analogus to the breakup of Bell telephone, where the service provider is a separate business from the infrastructure owner.

[Anonymous]

The Union Pacific is trying to right it self. True the may have faltered,but they are rectifying their mistakes[censored][censored]

[Anonymous]

Big deal!

[espeefoamer]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Randy Stahl

I've said it before UP s problems are not unique to the UP , All of the class ones suffer the same.
Randy

I'll say this again: The railroads in America are getting too big to manage properly.They are on the edge of collapsing under thier own weight.

[twhite]

I'm not anti-UP by any means (after all, Cecil B.deMille was able to make a pretty good movie about their early history) but being kind of new to this railroad merger game, I've got a few questions. When UP bought SP and inherited the Donner Pass route, all I heard was big speeches about how the route was going to be resuscitated and all the double track between Emigrant Gap and Truckee replaced, the tunnels on the original 1863-69 line widened and deepened for double-stacks. That was about ten years ago, I think. UP is still sending most of their former Overland freight via the Feather River canyon, which while very scenic for train-watchers and despite its easy 1% ruling grade, is single-track, curvy and VERY slow. Meanwhile, except for AMTRAK and non-container freights, the Donner Pass line is still limping along . And please don't tell me that it's because of a ruling 2.2% Eastward grade. Most new diesels could make hash out of that. Lord knows SP/s cab-forwards used to. My question is, WHAT HAPPENED? Is Donner Pass doomed to be the next Tennessee Pass? Lord, I HOPE not!

[Anonymous]

I think what larry described is inflation. Something that other countries represent to american business is more than just cheap labor. They also represent a complete lack of regulation, low or non-existent taxes, and (supported by our tax law) banks to put money tax free out of the reach of uncle sam.

But, this discussion is about the UP which like it or not is stuck right here in the U.S.A.. Maybe somewhere along the line, all of the "investments" designed to help employees (poeple) in the long run became "expenses" instead. I am always hearing how in europe business may be more tangled but run with an outlook of generations instead of quarters or years.

Maybe, because technology in the last hundred years has advanced so far so quickly, that as a society, we are constantly playing catchup, forcing us to become a culture of the short term. The guy out there pushing iron today is the same guy as a hundred years ago, the iron just lookes a little bit different. Since the time of cave men the basic problems of life have not changed.

[Anonymous]

That "Peters Principle" can be true all the way to the top, especially in the case of "absentee ownership" as we call stockownership.

When a guy is given more work to do, but gets his head chewed off for asking for more resources necessary to get it done, after awhile, an unhealthy pattern can get started where there is no choice but to start dropping work to tend priorities.

May not be the incompetance of the middle manager so much as the greed of the top to try and squeeze the unsqueezable

[tree68]

Two thoughts:

AntiGates' comments reminded me of that old bastion of management - The Peter Principle. Just because a person is a great first level supervisor doesn't mean they will be a great middle manager... Very possibly too many people have been promoted beyond their level of competency.

Second - One reason jobs are going overseas is because the work gets done cheaper there. We are up against a classic chicken/egg problem here, and you can't point the finger at any one group. Just because I start with labor doesn't mean they are to blame. Thus: Worker wants more pay to meet increased expenses/improve standard of living. Worker gets more pay. Employer raises prices to cover increase of costs. Worker wants more pay to meet increased expenses. Worker gets more pay. Employer raises prices to cover increase of costs.Worker wants more pay to meet increased expenses. Worker gets more pay. Employer raises prices to cover increase of costs. And so it goes. It's far more complicated, but you get my drift.

[Anonymous]

Whoops, forgot the closing metaphor,....When the chicken starts spiting the egg, it's not a pretty picture for either

[Anonymous]

I have to wonder how much of it is "chicken vs the egg"

Though I have never worked in railroading, I did work in management for 28 of the 20 years I wiorked for the same real estate company. And stood witness to managerial "misdirection" that takes place as a company grows, on several occassions.

It goes like this: you have a guy who can do his job well so you give him more to do, relying on "good ol Bob" to carry the ball for you Bob may be very good at what he does, middle management in this example, but after enough years of top management coming through, deciding "what else" he can or SHOULD be doing, you get to a point wher it's more than any one man cn do. If you complicate that with enough of the high powered executives from th top telling Bob "What ever you do, I don't EVER want to come through here again and see "this (new) portion of your job not done again" then Bob has to start shuffling priorities, and pretty soon Bob becomes more of an expert on the things that he safely can NOT get done, where he will be the only one who knows what isn't getting done, and his job becomes one of rushing around, putting out "fires"

I say this without knowing a darn thing about running a railroad simply because, for all the faults the "failing" railroads that ultimately came together under the UP flag, SP, CNW, Frisco, etc MANAGED to run a railroad for years longer as an on going entity before some genius decided that the holy grail was to merge, eliminate duplicity in function among the staff, and try to take advantage of the resulting numbers, yielding the current condition.

If you are establishing policy for large operation from a central location, you better be darn sure that policy "fits" the situation "all throughout the kingdom", if it doesn't because of unique local conditions,...you are sunk.

Sure, it's "all" just running a railroad, but one of the biggest benefits of 'decentralized' administration is flexibility, something that appears almost absent in the leviathon UP. All that "nasty flexibility" seems to be branded "waste" and cut out accordingly...

[Anonymous]

When the pressure on a steam engine exceeds a certain level, pop valves blow to reduce the pressure and to keep the boiler from exploding. UP's solution to the problem, however, is to reduce the size of the boiler!!!! As such, this breakdown represents no surprise.

Two scenario's come to mind and, undoubtedly, there are more. The rationalization of main line trackage such as the Modoc Line and trying to pass all traffic through Roseville was a really stupid move and failed strategy. It was an accident waiting to happen. The Modoc was the pop valve available to reduce Oregon congestion. But no more......

I also hear a lot about the need for a second main track on the Sunset Route. A pop valve that still exists is the Phoenix line west to Yuma. I believe it is still intact, albeit not used except for some small segments (someone correct me if I'm wrong). Why not resurrect this line as a second main line and initiate directional running? This would save millions in construction costs and would eliminate the installation of a second main track between Picacho and Wellton. It may not be the total solution to this serious problem, but at least for a few hundred miles, trains can move with a lot more freedom than they do now.

I've always said that wheels that don't move don't make money for the railroad. They have to be turning in order to make money. And it makes me sick to my stomach to see a railroad decline business and give it to their competitors. Ouch!!

UP's mismanagement and arrogance is amusing to watch. They have failed miserably which is why they had to drop the brilliant "We Can Handle It" trademark for nothing. All of this put together equals a not so proud chapter in the company history book.

[Anonymous]

This seems to be another Penn Central in the making at Union Pacific. Instead of the Wall Street stooges they have in the executive suites now, what Union Pacific and the other railroads need are RAILROAD men and /or women running the carriers, not these Wall Street Stooges whose only focus is the bottom line, which , while important, is not the only item of importance to the railroads' survival. They seem to have forgotten that service and dependable service is all they have to sell. The Erie Lackawanna formed in October 17,1960 realized this from the get go, and Penn Central, stumbled badly in this respect from February 1, 1968 on to its collapse a little over two years later. The breakdown now taking place at Union Pacific has a hauntingly familiar ring to it. The Penn Central's service meltdowns were similar in nature though it was the incompatible computer systems that were a major cause of it. Union Pacific today is made up of railroads that do not seem to be all that compatible with each other, especially Southern Pacific, which, by nature of its construction, is largely a single track railroad, which is where a good part of the problem lies. Double tracking as much of the SP as possible would go a long way toward alleviating a number of the operational delays as would be having an adequate number of train and engine crews and maintenance of way personnel on hand to properly run the property and keep it in top operating condition. That is where Union Pacific and other railroads fall down badly. And it is all coming home to roost. Management listening to too many Wall Street bean counters who do not know what the heck they are talking about telling railroad management where to cut back. Cutting back on train operating and maintenance of way personnel is starting to bite UP and the other railroads on the *** and the growing frequency of train accidents, both between t rains and between trains and highway vehicles at road crossings, together with increasingly malfunctioning signal devices are all reflecting this. Not only that, but safety in operations at all railroads has been so badly compromised to the breaking point that people are getting killed on the job with greater frequency as a result, and regardless of how carefully they work, too. One remedy would be to g et rid of this remote control nonsense and get adequate crews on the trains. Two man crews are not always enough.

[Anonymous]

Sad but true, so true. There are so many ways to point the finger, to write them all would be a waste of time. All I can say is that every day I try to do my part.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jruppert

Maybe not. But who buys stock in large american companies?
- Foreign conglomerates.

Then they REALLY tend to tighten the old screws,,, Like when Kone bought Montgomery elevator or Tyco bought Simplex, Grinnell, and ADT.

Granted, it's not good to see all that cashflow going overseas, but it doesn't bother me as much as seeing all the manufacturing jobs sweeping to foreign continents.

I mean a "sit on your duff all day and clip dividend coupons" stockholder is a "sit on your duff all day and clip dividend coupons" stockholder. where ever they are. Unfortunately the days where the owner of a company had pride in the products produced because they had his name on them are almost gone.

[Anonymous]

Maybe not. But who buys stock in large american companies?
- Foreign conglomerates.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jruppert

I also firmly believe taxes are the reason companies are moving to other countries. The common complaint is that cheap labor is the reason. Are taxes too high? Probably not, but this is just another way to cut a corner and keep the balance sheet looking good to investors.

LOL! Is UP pulling up spike and moving to china now?

[Anonymous]

I also firmly believe taxes are the reason companies are moving to other countries. The common complaint is that cheap labor is the reason. Are taxes too high? Probably not, but this is just another way to cut a corner and keep the balance sheet looking good to investors.

[Anonymous]

There is a trend in american business of companies buying out failing companies to assume their debt and then using that as a tax write-off by subtracting "lost" income from their balance sheets. This is similar to what happened at Enron.

[Randy Stahl]

I've said it before UP s problems are not unique to the UP , All of the class ones suffer the same.
Randy