As I noted above, faulty judgement is a sign of fatigue. Thus, without having the complete reports on those two incidents and not knowing if the fatigue factor was really pursued (Chatsworth we know was all about texting and cell phoning but we don't know the mental state off hand). The ability to think, act, and react, goes down as time goes forward unless there is a rest or refreshing time period. Thus, the end of a shift is probably more likely to be when an "accident" might occur. This does not rule out the first hour when you are still removing the cobwebs from your mind, but by the time one is on the job one is more likely awake and alert.
And don't say management doesn't care. It does...accidents interrupt the flow of traffic and an interupption in the flow of traffic is an interruption in the flow of money. Some are shortsighted, yes, but, management and many others are coming around to understanding the wider signs and implications of fatigue beyond just being sleepy.
I knew a family that owned car dealerships. Breakfast meetings every morning at 6. Close of day meetings everyday at 9:30 in the evening. Then home for dinner, go over the day's happenings and get ready for the next day's 6AM meeting. Little sleep. Lots of confusion. Jail time. Fatigue is a major issue in so many different areas of our lives.
RIDEWITHMEHENRY is the name for our almost monthly day of riding trains and transit in either the NYCity or Philadelphia areas including all commuter lines, Amtrak, subways, light rail and trolleys, bus and ferries when warranted. No fees, just let us know you want to join the ride and pay your fares. Ask to be on our email list or find us on FB as RIDEWITHMEHENRY (all caps) to get descriptions of each outing.
As gets proved here daily, when it comes to governance, those with no first hand experience with the issues always believe they have the answers. The carriers can have every possible rule and procedure in place and if the FRA or Congress want to implement their hair brained 'solution' they will.
Zug - how are the revised Hours of Service and rest rules working for you in keeping you alert and paid. The consensus from the crewmen on my territory is that the revised rules are doing nothing to enhance their 'real rest' and are stealing money from their bottom line.
Fatigue occurs, when it occurs. I have woken up and been totally fatigued after having had 9 hours sleep. I have been awake for 36 straight hours and set a personal best time at the race track. Time off is no guarantee of being alert. Our alertness ebbs and flows through our day...the less stimulus we have to respond to, the less alert we become....the more stimulation, the more alert. Under the right circumstance, the operation of a train (or any other form of transportation) can be one of the most monotonous and least stimulating activities going.
Thousands of motor vehicle accidents occur yearly because of the operator falling asleep, and the operation of a motor vehicle has many more stimuli to the operator than does the operation of commercial transportation mediums other than buses & trucks.
We can do many things in this world....legislating alertness is not one of them.
zugmann My point was that Graniteville and Chatsworth were the landmark incidents that brought to light two major issues (dark territory and electronics). Will a similar incident that highlights fatigue follow? I don't have a crystal ball - but if it does happen, then I would bet a week's paycheck that the railroad will NOT like the rules the government will enact. My opinion is that it would behoove the industry to start working on its own rules - instead of standing by with their thumbs up their SD70Aces.
My point was that Graniteville and Chatsworth were the landmark incidents that brought to light two major issues (dark territory and electronics). Will a similar incident that highlights fatigue follow? I don't have a crystal ball - but if it does happen, then I would bet a week's paycheck that the railroad will NOT like the rules the government will enact. My opinion is that it would behoove the industry to start working on its own rules - instead of standing by with their thumbs up their SD70Aces.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
I haven't been "on call" for a while now. I made more money last year than all other years, though. When I first came here we had 6 for 8 and it sucked. I will never miss that crap. Come home at 6am to be called at noon. No thanks.
There are lots of people that can't handle their rest. But the new rest rules (As I pointed out before) are not helping. I like the 10 hour rule, but it is not addressing the fatigue issue. Hence the 5 pages of discussion.
It's been fun. But it isn't much fun anymore. Signing off for now.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.t fun any
Some years ago, I helped a number of air traffic controllers try to manage the stress of their jobs better. Of course it is different than rail work, but probably even more stressful. Stress can come from both over-stimulation and from boredom. Chronic stress can interfere with memory, judgment, reaction times and attention, along with sleep (which can cause problems with all the preceding items) and emotional state. Hence the need for more predictability in schedules, so as to reduce at least one factor in "human error accidents." The world is interconnected and as zug pointed out, what affects engineers concerns the rest of us.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
Once again we have another RE collision at night with a crew apparrently passing signals, it's an unfortunate truth that the carriers have found so many loop holes in the new hours of service law that we are now working more hours than before! We're not quite at the middle of the year and I have grossed as much as I made all of last year. - Not really my goal. I have however missed uncles funeral,family gatherings, etc. etc. I work 6 days a week, and usually have Monday off when the pools pile up at home. I spend 12-15 hours at home and 25-35 at the hotel waiting for my next train home. No one knows when that will be, therefore I never know when to sleep and when to wake up.
I loathe meeting other trains at control points as I know they may be asleep and totally unaware. We've begun trying to run the railroad on a schedule and for originating trains it works pretty well when a remote R2D2 hasn't plowed into a train and stacked up cars in the middle of the yard. Through trains are a little tougher but we seem to be able to hold the "hot" stack trains to a predictable schedule. Those trains that have assigned crews are terrific for your sanity if you can hold them and if they don't just die both directions. Clearly assigned crews has to be the next step towards safety, along with the 10-12 hour call.
zugmann Georgia Railroader: Just accept that and move on, we're gonna be ok. Pay me now or pay me later. If the railroads refuse to address the issue themselves, then the feds will eventually ram it down their throats with a reactionary act after the next Chatsworth. The railroads like to claim the current system gives them "flexibility". More like it allows them to continue to be incompetent.
Georgia Railroader: Just accept that and move on, we're gonna be ok.
Just accept that and move on, we're gonna be ok.
Pay me now or pay me later. If the railroads refuse to address the issue themselves, then the feds will eventually ram it down their throats with a reactionary act after the next Chatsworth.
The railroads like to claim the current system gives them "flexibility". More like it allows them to continue to be incompetent.
I agree. It takes an act of congress to get the carriers to do anything.
BaltACD As gets proved here daily, when it comes to governance, those with no first hand experience with the issues always believe they have the answers. The carriers can have every possible rule and procedure in place and if the FRA or Congress want to implement their hair brained 'solution' they will. Zug - how are the revised Hours of Service and rest rules working for you in keeping you alert and paid. The consensus from the crewmen on my territory is that the revised rules are doing nothing to enhance their 'real rest' and are stealing money from their bottom line. Fatigue occurs, when it occurs. I have woken up and been totally fatigued after having had 9 hours sleep. I have been awake for 36 straight hours and set a personal best time at the race track. Time off is no guarantee of being alert. Our alertness ebbs and flows through our day...the less stimulus we have to respond to, the less alert we become....the more stimulation, the more alert. Under the right circumstance, the operation of a train (or any other form of transportation) can be one of the most monotonous and least stimulating activities going. Thousands of motor vehicle accidents occur yearly because of the operator falling asleep, and the operation of a motor vehicle has many more stimuli to the operator than does the operation of commercial transportation mediums other than buses & trucks. We can do many things in this world....legislating alertness is not one of them. zugmann: My point was that Graniteville and Chatsworth were the landmark incidents that brought to light two major issues (dark territory and electronics). Will a similar incident that highlights fatigue follow? I don't have a crystal ball - but if it does happen, then I would bet a week's paycheck that the railroad will NOT like the rules the government will enact. My opinion is that it would behoove the industry to start working on its own rules - instead of standing by with their thumbs up their SD70Aces.
zugmann: My point was that Graniteville and Chatsworth were the landmark incidents that brought to light two major issues (dark territory and electronics). Will a similar incident that highlights fatigue follow? I don't have a crystal ball - but if it does happen, then I would bet a week's paycheck that the railroad will NOT like the rules the government will enact. My opinion is that it would behoove the industry to start working on its own rules - instead of standing by with their thumbs up their SD70Aces.
BaltACD you absolutley nailed it. We get trainmasters fresh out of college who come out here and try to reinvent the wheel, when they have never laced up a pair of boots and spent two minutes out here in the real world. The carriers dont want to promote from within anymore, they would rather hire a college grad and brainwash them. Now I dont mean to knock them and be so harsh, they're just trying to make a living like we are. What I have a problem with is them pulling a 30 plus year vet out of service for what they thought was a rule violation when they couldn't buy a clue about rail operations, or operating rules if they had the CEO's money.
Here's the bottom line. We work in a dangerous industry, 15,000 tons of steel are unforgiving. We do our jobs to the best of our ability, but we also have lives outside the railroad. We have family, friends, events, games, and all the other great things in life that keep us sane when we're not working. We want to spend as much time doing those things as possible, and as a result our rest sometimes suffers. I can and have ran on as little as a couple hours sleep, hell I've worked 12 hours with no rest in the past 30 plus hours. I've been called with no rest when there was no train scheduled. I've also sat first out on the board for five straight days, not knowing when to sleep.
Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes, but so does just being incompetent, and the carriers hire a steady crop of those. They want warm bodies out here doesn't matter if you have the IQ of a fence post. But it's not just new hires that make mistakes, we all do at some point, we're human.
Georgia Railroader Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes, but so does just being incompetent, and the carriers hire a steady crop of those. They want warm bodies out here doesn't matter if you have the IQ of a fence post. But it's not just new hires that make mistakes, we all do at some point, we're human.
That's the whole thing. This whole "I'm macho and can handle it attitude" is not helping manners any. Yes, we're humans and humans need rest. Basic science 101.
There are also incompetent people out here - but that is another issue entirely.
zugmann Georgia Railroader: Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes, but so does just being incompetent, and the carriers hire a steady crop of those. They want warm bodies out here doesn't matter if you have the IQ of a fence post. But it's not just new hires that make mistakes, we all do at some point, we're human. That's the whole thing. This whole "I'm macho and can handle it attitude" is not helping manners any. Yes, we're humans and humans need rest. Basic science 101. There are also incompetent people out here - but that is another issue entirely.
Georgia Railroader: Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes, but so does just being incompetent, and the carriers hire a steady crop of those. They want warm bodies out here doesn't matter if you have the IQ of a fence post. But it's not just new hires that make mistakes, we all do at some point, we're human.
It's not a matter of being "macho" as you like to say, it's a matter of being able to do your job. Thanks for the science lesson though. Read my post again, I never said I was a machine that can keep going day after day with no rest. I am fully aware of my limitations.
Georgia Railroader I am fully aware of my limitations.
I am fully aware of my limitations.
Yeah, they all say that.
zugmann Georgia Railroader: I am fully aware of my limitations. Yeah, they all say that.
Georgia Railroader: I am fully aware of my limitations.
Yea that aint all they say.
Georgia Railroader[ snipped and rearranged - PDN] Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes . . .
Georgia Railroader I've been called with no rest when there was no train scheduled. I've also sat first out on the board for five straight days, not knowing when to sleep.
- Paul North.
Paul: Good strategy to try to sort out the various contributing variables in order to come up with a "solution."
But as has been pointed out, simple sleep patterns are not the whole story...compounded stress factors over long periods of time add to fatigue problems.
The problem with scheduling transportation is that reality always throws the best schedule out of whack. Something, anything, happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system.
In the railroad environment the standard 2 hour call figure is only accurate about 90% of the time...if you are figuring operations on a 50 MPH railroad that 2 hour call represents 100 miles...a lot can happen in 100 miles to throw the call seriously off the figure. My carrier has ID runs that require a 3 hour call...that is 150 miles of potential pot holes and delays....some have mentioned 10 or 12 hour call figures....that is 500 to 600 miles and don't forget....the problem that ties up the line need not be with the train that is the one being called.
Were anyone to devise a scheduling system that
1. Had the crew ALWAYS on duty just as it's train arrived
2. Had the crew ALWAYS leaving their away from home terminal on their legal rest.
3. Always permitted crews to spend their maximum time at home knowing when their next duty cycle would begin 12 or more hours in advance.
Not only would the railroads beat a path to your door carrying bags of gold - so would all other forms of transportation where their manpower moves between points and have rest provisions concerning when they can be on duty. Ever since man began moving from one point to another, the journey has been fraught with unexpected peril which makes accurately forecasting the arrival at destination a crapshoot. I have not devised that system and it is not for the lack of 40+ years of trying.
Paul_D_North_Jr Georgia Railroader: [ snipped and rearranged - PDN] Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes . . . Tough issue, especially since all people can have "good days" and "bad days" as both you and BaltACD have pointed out. Even with a much more predictable schedule, some people will still have some problems with alertness on some days. But as I point out below, the total magnitude of the problem can be reduced considerably, and that perhaps makes it less necessary to separate the two groups. Georgia Railroader: I've been called with no rest when there was no train scheduled. I've also sat first out on the board for five straight days, not knowing when to sleep. But that kind of practice only aggravates the problem. Minimizing this counter-productive scheduling then leaves us with mostly the 'people' problem mentioned above - instead of the present mix of a problem that results from both scheduling and people problems. Getting rid of the 'poor scheduling' part of the problem - might it be as much as half of the total problem ? - would be a good start. - Paul North.
Georgia Railroader: [ snipped and rearranged - PDN] Most of us can handle this lifestyle. Some can never get used to it and continue to come to work tired and worn out. So what do you do? How do you seperate the two groups? Fatigue leads to mistakes . . .
Georgia Railroader: I've been called with no rest when there was no train scheduled. I've also sat first out on the board for five straight days, not knowing when to sleep.
Sure I think getting everything on some sort of schedule would certainly help. It would be nice to know when I'm going to work so I can plan my day and rest accordingly. Sure we all have bad days. There's times when no matter how much rest you're running on it feels like a battle just to stay awake. The job can get very boring at times, and unlike some class 1 RR's we are not allowed to nap while stopped. A power nap can work wonders, but we'll get fired if a TM thinks we're sleeping.
BaltACD The problem with scheduling transportation is that reality always throws the best schedule out of whack. Something, anything, happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system. . . . My carrier has ID runs . . . Ever since man began moving from one point to another, the journey has been fraught with unexpected peril which makes accurately forecasting the arrival at destination a crapshoot. I have not devised that system and it is not for the lack of 40+ years of trying.
. . . My carrier has ID runs . . .
Ever since man began moving from one point to another, the journey has been fraught with unexpected peril which makes accurately forecasting the arrival at destination a crapshoot. I have not devised that system and it is not for the lack of 40+ years of trying.
"ID" = "Inter-Divisional" (long) crew districts - correct ?
I hear you, BaltACD - keep trying, will ya ?
I suspect that if a railroad were to hire a bunch of efficiency and process control experts of the "Just-In-Time", W. Edward Deming, "Six SIgma" kind to try and bring more order and predictability to the chaos - such things as surprise trains from other railroads, unreliable and malfunctioning locomotives, track inspectors finding defective rails, etc., the demands of those experts for more precision and less 'slack' would quickly drive the railroad operating people nuts.
Conversely, a fine-tuned scheduled operating plan could be turned into recycling paper and confetti by just a single grade crossing accident on a multi-track main line, or a tree down across a pole line, or a washout - none of which involve any 'fault' or anything reasonably preventable on the railroad's part - and that kind of random-chance event would drive those guys nuts as well.
That said - merely because perfection cannot be achieved does not mean that the industry should not be striving for a better level of operational predictability.
How does that aspect of operations today compare to how it was done in 1999-2000, right after the ConRail split-up ? 1990, just as the industry was starting to rebound ? 1980, when the industry was kind of surprised to find that it was still alive ? 1970, in the midst of the Penn Central and other NorthEast RR bankruptcies, and at least the B&O was just barely hanging on (at least as it seemed to me then) ? I'll be surprised if the trend hasn't been towards more scheduled and predictable operations - slowly, perhaps, but headed in that direction.
Someone once wrote that man consistently over-estimates what he can accomplish in the short-term, but under-estimates what he can accomplish over the long term. That principle seems applicable to this conundrum, and may be helpful in maintaining efforts at improvement over the long haul, even though it seems to some people that there's nothing more that can be done about it now, so it's not worth trying (that was John Kneiling's definition of a pessimist - in his world, an optimist found problems that could be fixed to improve matters).
I can't speak for other Class I carriers, however, my carrier has tried virtually every performance enhancing process that rises to the top of the Buzzword lexicon ... we probably have as many Six Sigma graduates as we have locomotives.The Six Sigma analysis has been applied to all forms of processes that the company uses from servicing locomotives, repairing cars, calling crews, scheduling trains and any and every other kind of process that the company uses. In the monkey see, monkey do, world of rail management I am certain all the other carriers have done similar things.
While T&E personnel view 'Quality of Life' as a laughable buzz word....the carriers are actually trying to improve it....it is not a simple task. especially since not everyone view quality of life through the same sightlines....what is one persons desired quality, is not necessarily someone else's. While the carriers strive for perfection....the definition of perfection changes based up who is asked and when they are asked.
Why is it that it behooves Americans that thing can be done, and done well, on a timetable. Passenger systems do it with a certain amount of reasonablness: look at commuter operations today, like NJT, MNRR, and the real test of time (pun?) the LIRR. Most all railroads in the US used to work on timetable and train orders and did well at it with very precise execution. Europe schedules departures on the half minute! So, put away the excuses, the what if this or that, the what happens when, and we can't beacuses and actually work at running trains to provide a service that customers will pay for. No it doesn't have to be on the half second or blowing out the markers of the guy that takes the siding, but do set up a reasonable timetable and work at making it happen. And don't scrap the timetable because it gets missed one day and you end up operating a half a day off until next time when you fall back to not catch up to a semblence of schedule. It can't be done because everybody says it can't be done then all set out to prove the negative! For the most part, infact, it has proven to work and customers do pay for the good service. It is just unremarked. As I said, it doesn't have to be precise to the second but, for freight, within a reasonble window.
Henry - you have NO IDEA how hard todays carriers try to operate a scheduled network....not having it operate on time is not from a lack of scheduling or from a lack of trying to maintain the schedules.
So how is it that schedules used to work here (had to) with timetable and train order railroading. They do currently in Europe, with a much heavier traffic density, where schedules are adhered to, with generally few exceptions. You say "reality throws the best schedule out of whack" and "something, anything happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system." So that seems to make the schedule impossible to keep. In other places, things happen too, or are you suggesting more incidents, engine failures, et al. occur here? If so, that is another set of problems that should be addressed.
Big difference between cute little hi speed passenger trains and 12,000+ freights going up 2.5% grades...
Mechanical Department "No no that's fine shove that 20 pound set all around the yard... those shoes aren't hell and a half to change..."
The Missabe Road: Safety First
As I suspected, it is assumed it can't be done, it is often stated so and all kinds of arguements are made as to why we can't do it, and so we've never been able to achieve it, and so it can't be done. So, I guess, why discuss it.?..the status quo is the way it is and always will be and, evidently, the way it has to be.
coborn35 Big difference between cute little hi speed passenger trains and 12,000+ freights going up 2.5% grades...
Big difference between a line with hundreds of trains of various sorts (passenger and freight) versus a few slow-moving freights on an all freight line. As many of you rail folks like to tell us non-rail folks, since you have no actual experience with what we've mentioned, you don't know anything about it.
schlimm So how is it that schedules used to work here (had to) with timetable and train order railroading. They do currently in Europe, with a much heavier traffic density, where schedules are adhered to, with generally few exceptions. You say "reality throws the best schedule out of whack" and "something, anything happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system." So that seems to make the schedule impossible to keep. In other places, things happen too, or are you suggesting more incidents, engine failures, et al. occur here? If so, that is another set of problems that should be addressed.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
Sulzer is a brand name of diesel engine. Those SP and D&RGW diesel-hydraulic drive locomotives were built by Krauss-Maffei (sp ?) - but I can't recall if they had Sulzers in them or not, though.
P.S. - Unless, of course, they were a very early "alternate-fuel" version of locomotives powered by - oh, say, seltzer water and carbide powder (like the kids' Bangsite [TM] cannons - makes a noisy explosive mixture of acetylene gas, if I recall correctly . . . ). - PDN.
Murphy Siding schlimm: So how is it that schedules used to work here (had to) with timetable and train order railroading. They do currently in Europe, with a much heavier traffic density, where schedules are adhered to, with generally few exceptions. You say "reality throws the best schedule out of whack" and "something, anything happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system." So that seems to make the schedule impossible to keep. In other places, things happen too, or are you suggesting more incidents, engine failures, et al. occur here? If so, that is another set of problems that should be addressed. I have to suggest that you're doing the ol' aples and oranges shuffle here. Europe may have heavier traffic density, I don't know. Overall, they are hauling a lot less tons, in smaller trains over shorter distances on rail systems that are heavily subsidised by their governments. Other than that, they are exactly the same, and there is no reason they can't be run the same. A good analogy might be the selzier(?) locomotives that SP bought. They worked in Europe, they should work here-right?
schlimm: So how is it that schedules used to work here (had to) with timetable and train order railroading. They do currently in Europe, with a much heavier traffic density, where schedules are adhered to, with generally few exceptions. You say "reality throws the best schedule out of whack" and "something, anything happens and throws one element of the schedule seriously off schedule and then all the disruptions cascade down the system." So that seems to make the schedule impossible to keep. In other places, things happen too, or are you suggesting more incidents, engine failures, et al. occur here? If so, that is another set of problems that should be addressed.
I have to suggest that you're doing the ol' aples and oranges shuffle here.
Europe may have heavier traffic density, I don't know. Overall, they are hauling a lot less tons, in smaller trains over shorter distances on rail systems that are heavily subsidised by their governments. Other than that, they are exactly the same, and there is no reason they can't be run the same. A good analogy might be the selzier(?) locomotives that SP bought. They worked in Europe, they should work here-right?
Let's just leave it with Germany, since I am familiar with that first hand. Very heavy traffic density, i.e., # of trains operating on trackage in a given time period, freight and passenger. Tonnage is irrelevant, and so is government ownership, which is only partial. DB makes a profit overall. Distance somewhat relevant. The main variable factor is traffic density, in terms of maintaining schedules or not. They can do it. Why not the US railroads? As henry6 says, It would be nice to hear something besides feeble excuses.
The Krauss-Maffei ML 4000's had twin Maybach Diesel prime movers.
Actually, timetable and train order railroading didn't mean the trains "had" to run on time. One of the important reasons for train orders was to modify the "timetable" to match the actual times of the trains as they appeared and keep the line reasonably fluid. In particular, schedules for freight trains were often just a theoretical starting point and they might be given an order to run six hours late if that was when they showed up.
Passenger and freight operation, Europe and North America, present different challenges. A 120-car freight has 20 times the chance of a mechanical problem compared with a 6-car passenger train. A 2,000 mile journey presents 10 times the chance of a problem compared with a 200 mile journey. Combine the two and the odds are already 200 times worse. Many North American routes have substantial segments of single track, very little consists of more than two main tracks. When something happens with one train the flexibility does not exist to keep everything else fluid.
The fatigue issue is real, and I am sure the situation could be improved. Unfortunately it will require cooperation, compromise and flexibility on the part of both rail management and the union members. None of those three words come to mind as describing the all too common adversarial relationship existing today; both sides are at fault.
My opinion.
John
Here is part of the reason, or some of the differences between the European freight trains and their American counterparts.
The European model you guys love so much, and hold up as some type of benchmark is shorter, lighter, and has quite a lot less distance to run.
As for their passenger rail, most, (not all) run on state sponsored, built and maintained separate right of way.
And they run at a loss.
Europeans treat and expect their railroads to be run as a public service/utility, heavily subsidized for the most part, they are not profit oriented.
European railroads for the most part run between set distribution points, where the majority of their loads are trans loaded from the truck to the train and then from the train back to truck for delivery to the customer, most often in a container type system, very rarely do they run a local that works industries, and when they do, it is almost always as a unit train, that local only pulls and spots that one industry.
You are comparing two totally different systems, driven by two totally different types of markets and totally different economies.
About the only thing they have in common are steel wheels on steel rails.
You want something to really compare American freight railroading to, go to South America, and look at place like Chile and Brazil.
Personally, I would love to see a European train drag 120 car grain train of the same weight we handle every day.
Schlimm and Henry...
Get real figures, like tons moved, miles moved, and number of trains yearly, and place them side by side with the figures from American railroads.
I would hazard a guess that there is more miles of track inside my county, (Harris, Texas) than a lot of the European countries have inside their entire border.
By my map, a LA to Chicago intermodal train could start at Limoges, France, cross all of west Europe, and end up at Minsk, in the USSR with a few miles left over.
Here is something to consider.
The Teague Ami, a daily BNSF mixed freight that arrives at PTRA, travels almost the same distance as a train traveling from the west border to the east border of France.
The Teague Ami originates and ends totally inside Texas.
It brings on average 100 cars daily.
I think you will find that the entire West European system miles is not equivalent to the miles owned and operated by UP or BNSF individually.
I may be mistaken, but I bet it will still be close.
I love it when people compare American freight railroading to European, because whenever I ask for a real line by comparison, apples to apples oranges to oranges, they never come up with the figures...they claim that it's not fair.
Yet the same folks have no fairness issue when they toss out "the Europeans do this, and schedule that and ..." and "it's better because".
Yup, the Europeans do schedule, and the French railroaders, under contract, only work 4 days a week, their insurance is "paid for" by their government, (we pay for over half of ours, the carrier pays the difference).
You are comparing a somewhat small, closed and managed economy with a huge, open free market place economy.
That doesn't quite offer any real comparison.
True, they schedule trains, they have no choice, if they ran trains as "extras" like most American Class 1 roads, they would have trains stacked up nose to tail simply because of the size constraints.
So, if you want me,( and I suspect a few others) to buy into the "Europeans are better" or "the European system works better" ideology, post some real numbers.
Average train length.
Average train miles traveled.
Average tons moved, annually or monthly, either one works.
Yup, the European trains are faster, but they are also shorter, lighter and have less distance to travel.
When I was a kid, with the exception of railroads and the refineries and oil fields, everything down here
was closed on Sundays.
If you were lucky, a gas station might be open, and a grocery store might be open on reduced hours, but
everyone had weekends off.
I live about 2 miles from a Kroger Flagship Grocery store, which is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
You drive by that place at 3am, and the parking lot is just as full as it is at 5pm.
Our entire culture, and the way we do business has changed so radically it's scary.
Yup, a lot of companies do still run 5 days a week, but a whole lot run all the time, and that number grows bigger every year.
Did you ever wonder why railroads embraced CTC so eagerly and tossed the train order system out as quickly as they did?
Because CTC allows you to run more, even bigger trains closer together.
More trains equals more stuff moved equals more money made, all driven by consumer demand.
That demand is totally different in Europe.
Their entire supply and demand system is way different than ours.
Their cultural and social requirements are different than ours.
How many grain elevators in Europe take two 120 car grain trains and turn them around in 24 hours?
We spot and pull at least 2 daily in the Cargill elevator here, and that's just one elevator out of five on the Houston ship channel, and we are just one of several ports on the Gulf of Mexico that exports grain.
I doubt that most people outside of the rail industry really know or realize how huge the volume of goods shipped by rail in America really is.
I work for a Class 3 Switching and Terminal railroad, we currently roster around 300 T&E employees and our annual car handling is between 300 and 500 thousand cars with 177 miles of track and 450 industrial customers ranging from steel to automobiles, grain, pet coke and just about every petrochemical you can think of, shoot, we even have a customer that gets a reefer of butter every once in a while.
That's a lot of stuff.
And we are a small railroad.
Just like Class 1 railroads, we have a mix of scheduled customers, and a mix of customers whose demands and needs has to be flexible.
And no Schlimm, the "status quo" is not the accepted way.
We change what and how we do things all the time.
Practices that were common when I hired out are gone, safety has improved tremendously and average tons per mile is so much more than what was run even 10 years ago.
How trains are blocked and classified changes all the time, it totally depends on the customers.
Could we go back to train orders, scheduled freights and such?
Sure could, but when we do, I would like you guys to explain the Shell Deer Park Refinery why, instead of the 75 car pull and spot we serve them twice every 24 hours, they can only get 40 cars once a day because of the schedule.
You go tell them to tool down, cut production back and lay off workers.
Or Phillips Plastic Division....we pull 95 car plastic pellets hoppers out of there at least once a day, and they want them gone as soon as they drop a dime on us, because they have a plant that runs 24 hours a day, every day, and there are 300 loaded cars in their yard waiting on customer orders.
They call us, we call BNSF as soon as we hang up from them and order up power and a crew to be at Pasadena by XX hours to haul this thing out of our yard.
We send a crew out on the next shift to Phillips and they get pulled.
BNSF is waiting, often we use their power so all our guys have to do is pull into Pasadena and swap crews with BNSF and that thing is gone from our property.
You can't "schedule" crews for something like that.
Well, you could, but I don't want to be the guy to tell Phillips they only get service at a specific time, or be the guy to tell their customer in New Jersey that makes those plastic bags you get at the grocery store his 5 hoppers of plastic are not going to arrive until the schedule says so.
You tell him that, and the guy is going to blow a gasket, because he has standing orders from two grocery chains for 300thousand bags a week, and you just shut him down.
The system has to be flexible, and the people who work in it also have to be flexible.
There is a reason for all the SIT yards near major industrial cities, because you have to be able to tag and drag of this stuff on a moment's notice.
And Class 1 roads, just like us, have both "schedules" and flexibility; it's the only way they can operate.
That's not status quo, that's simply the economics of the business.
You couldn't put all of the volume of freight from American railroads on European rails, it simply wouldn't fit.
Not real sure why you think density is the benchmark in American railroading.
I could put 2 carseach behind 50 locomotives and run 'emall out on the transcon 5 minutes apart, and claim to be running a traffic dense railroad, but in reality all I am doing is running a 100 car train in a whole lot of sections, and wasting a lot of crew money and diesel fuel.
By the way, if you want density, go watch the Powder River joint line.
60 plus trains a day, each 120 car length, they haul that stuff out of there as fast as they can load the things up.
Most tracks only have a finite capacity, you exceed that, increase your density, and any major problem backs the whole thing up, not to mention rear end collisions happen, and people get killed.
And yes, distance is relative, you want to run a 3000 mile railroad like a 700 mile railroad?
How?
Your car count and volume would fall through the floor.
You claim the Germans and by inference European railroads do it better, but they don't, they simply do it differently, because their needs and market drive them to.
So, pony up some real numbers, and let's see who hauls more stuff farther.
I think is will be like comparing a Kenworth to a Toyota, but hey, who knows....
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