With the thought of CSX sparking a few line spinoffs, anyone have any idea of what might be on the table as viable candidates?
Michigan, Florida, Illinois, Indinana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, Canada
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
You left out New York...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
tree68You left out New York...
New York and Mass. are for the Wall Street Supporters
I know if they put up the old RI line they run Iowa Interstate will grab that one faster than a pizza disappers at a Weight Watchers convention.
What lines would be of interest to BNSF & UP? Would CSX sell lines to either, or both western railroads?
Victrola1 What lines would be of interest to BNSF & UP? Would CSX sell lines to either, or both western railroads?
Shadow the Cats owner I know if they put up the old RI line they run Iowa Interstate will grab that one faster than a pizza disappers at a Weight Watchers convention.
CSX doesn't own that line. They have a long term lease on it with IAIS subleasing parts of the west end. I'm sure your right that IAIS would love to get the whole thing if they could.
Jeff
Which lines in Pennsylvania might they want to spin off and would NS be interested ina any?
BaltACDMichigan, Florida, Illinois, Indinana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, Canada
Why not Kentucky?
BaltACD tree68 You left out New York... New York and Mass. are for the Wall Street Supporters
tree68 You left out New York...
Who gets New Jersey ?
MidlandMike BaltACD tree68 You left out New York... New York and Mass. are for the Wall Street Supporters Who gets New Jersey ?
The Christe estate of excess chlosterol.
More likely it would be RJ Corman or Genessee & Wyoming interested in getting CSX lines in PA.
Anything for Mantle Ridge to hoover out the money from the shell.
Los Angeles Rams Guysee if CSXT would be willing to part with their portion of the former PRR Chicago - New York mainline between Tolleston, Indiana and Crestline, Ohio
Perhaps now would be a good time to push a high-speed passenger rail initiative proposing one of those public/private partnerships where some rich guy gets to control the farebox, and the taxpayer gets to pay all the bills?
BaltACD Anything for Mantle Ridge to hoover out the money from the shell.
Balt,
I hear what you are saying. Hedge funds are the modern day "Carl Ichan corporate raiders". Make a quick turn, grab the money, sell while stocks are high and 'git while the gittin's good'. Sell un-needed assets till the company bleeds in order to raise profit margins and cash.
Most small investors, those seeking either dividens or building their portfolio for retirement are seeking long term benefits. The other side of the equation is those who would deny/rob those small investors. Seems to be the way of life theese days.
Legal? Perhaps. Ethical? Doubtful, but the matra is now every man for himself and those who have the ability to control major corporations have the advantage.
Both my sister and I had stock in General Motors given they were a huge presence in our area and were profitable for most of our lives. When I saw them going downhill I bailed. I saved my principal and she hung on. I have no idea how much she lost by doing so.
As the Kenny Rogers song said "Know when to hold 'em know when to fold 'em. Until CSX gets theit act back together they will not get a dime of my money.
Norm
BaltACD Michigan, Florida, Illinois, Indinana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, Canada
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
Despite the fact that Michigan has its own budgetary woes, it's been pretty active in maintaining a passenger rail network. Perhaps CSX can give the state a good price for its line from Grand Rapids to somewhere in the Detroit area, and offer a passenger schedule to connect Detroit (or Plymouth) to GR via Lansing.
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
I wonder if NS would be interested in the CSX line from Hagerstown, Md up through Gettysburg, PA and then down to Baltimore. Md/
They also have a yard in Hagerstown and it would allow them to not only get to Harrisburg, via Chambersburg, Pa. There already is a CSX/NS connection in Chambersburg, PA and it would give them a shorter route to Baltimore.
Well, since it’s a fire sale, BNSF from Memphis to Nashville.
CShaveRR Despite the fact that Michigan has its own budgetary woes, it's been pretty active in maintaining a passenger rail network. Perhaps CSX can give the state a good price for its line from Grand Rapids to somewhere in the Detroit area, and offer a passenger schedule to connect Detroit (or Plymouth) to GR via Lansing.
Our State hasn't had any "budget woes". We're not drowning in debt, like some other states. Instead, we play a giant game of tug-of-war over what to spend our money on. You know, the way it should be. Lesser men choose to not choose and spend all of the money, instead of battling over how to divide up what we have. I've been pleased to be a citizen of Michigan, and I think by and large there is enough compromise and balance that everybody gets some of what they want.
That being said, while I have no on-the-job experience with the CSX lines in Michigan, I have spent many years studying them and so here are my thoughts about the whole question of CSX trimmings in Michigan.
For those unaware, first off, some exposition. The current CSX is Michigan is a distillation of the old Pere Marquette, altough much shrunken via the C&O, Chessie and more recently CSX. What's left is the Flint-Plymouth-Toldeo main, and the Porter, IN-Grand Rapids-Plymouth-Detroit main. There is a short branch in Grand Rapids used to access several shortlines, and they also own the PH&D out of Port Huron, accessed from Flint via trackage rights with the CN.
The last round of sell-offs was around 2005, when CSX sold the branch to Muskegon from West Olive (near Holland) to RailAmerica's Michigan Shore. They also sold-off/leased out the branches north of Grand Rapids to Marquette Rail. These two are both G&W properties now, and interchange exclusively with CSX at Holland and Grand Rapids, respectively. Also in 2005, CSX sold their way out of Saginaw, giving everything north of McGrew Yard in Flint to the LSRC, leaving us with the present arrangement.
CSX's operations are concentrated mostly in the Detroit area, of course with their share of the CRSA and the manufacrutring base. Many trains operate from Detroit via Plymouth and/or Carleton to Toldeo. This includes heavy local traffic and the auto sorting yard at New Boston. It is exceedingly unlikely, therefore, that CSX would sell of this portion of the railroad, east and south of Plymouth. It originates so much traffic, that it's price would be quite high.
Alternately, you have west of Plymouth via GR to Porter, which is moslty composed of the significant online traffic base, and the shortline interchanges with the WMI, MS, GRE, MQT, GDLK, JAIL and GLC. They also have two busy grain elevators and the power plant at West Olive, which recieves a coal train per day, average. This line segment is considered to be secondary, and rarely hosts much overhead traffic, although since EHH has been installed, has seen much more of it than in the more recent past, including most recently a bunch of Detroit intermodal traffic.
Third, you have the stuff north of Plymouth to Flint, which used to be crazy busy but now has just modest online traffic. Most of the traffic here is overhead to the interchange with the LSRC in Flint and the PH&D property.
Alright, so here are my thoughts. I see three distinct, somewhat likely scenarios I'll discuss. There are more possibilities, but I consider them pretty darn unlikely.
Scenario A: Sale of Plymouth-Flint. This one seems like the most likely of the scenarios, and wouldn't impact whether or not the others happen. The idea here is that the LSRC would purchase their way from Flint to Plymouth, moving the interchange with CSX to North Yard in Plymouth or maybe Lincoln Yard in Novi. He biggest hang-up with this is that CSX would further land-lock their PH&D property, which is a cash cow according to sources, with lucerative chemical and fuel traffic. Therefore, there is the question of whether or not the PH&D would be excluded somehow or if that would derail this effort altogether. CSX may just be happy to serve the local customers on this stretch in order to keep the PH&D, accepting the LSRC interchange at Flint. I'd personally assign the chance of this sale happening, at least of the Flint-Plymouth line, a 30% chance by 2025.
Scenario B: Sale of Porter-Plymouth. This one has been thought about for much longer than most realize. Yes, this is about Canadian Pacific. I've recieved plenty of flack for this in the past, as some just think us Michigan railfans are obsessed with CP - and maybe we are, because our line used to see 24 trains per day but now 5-6 is a good number. We want CP back. But those hopes aside, the quantitive facts are that CP, upon their exit around 2005 and again in 2010, did attempt to purchase the line, but couldn't meet CSX's price. What we know now is that Harrison's buddy is in charge at CP, so in theory the tracks are greased for a transaction compared with previously. This sale would give CP their own line from Chicagoland to Detroit. They'd avoid most of the NS, but then have to take over their own line, run it, and yes it needs some upgrades in terms of sidings and some signalling to run trains over 5-8000' in mass. So, I think the idea of this hinges more on CP's love/hate relationship with NS than it does CSX's sale price. CP has to be both willing to move and meet CSX's price. I'd also expect CSX to retain Plymouth to Detroit for themselves, so there'd have to be a trackage rights bridge on both ends of the line for CP, from Hick to Porter in Indiana, and Plymouth to Detroit in Michigan. But it cuts out the vast majority of the pesky NS. Is it worth it? I give this about a 20% chance by 2025.
Scenario C: MDOT pruchase. This one looked much much better around about 2014 than it does now. First and foremost, the Federal cash prizes are gone. MDOT used mostly federal funds to grab the Michigan Line from Kalamazoo to Dearborn from the NS, and for awhile it looked like CSX was teeing up a sale from Plymouth to GR for MDOT, or at least trying to get them to pay for line upgrades in exchange for a new DET-GRR service. Alas, with the funding gone, it is extremely unlikely, I think. The Michigan Line was a match made in heaven, since NS already had minimal online traffic, no overhead traffic, and thus no real reason to keep it around. So MDOT got their chance at a higher-speed railroad, and NS kept their freight business, which is all they really wanted. NS seemed happy with the way Porter-Kzoo was, and so now most of the rest of the old Michigan Central is setup similarly. However, MDOT is sturggling to finish the planned upgrades of that line, needing at least one more big funding push to finish it all, particularly curve upgrades from Jackson to Ypsilanti. With the MDOT Rail office busy pushing that project towards completion, and in need of cash, I doubt they're paying much attention to the CSX, at least for now. For awhile it seemed like they were gaining momentum towards a second Pere Marquette Serice to Chicago, and maybe an extension to Detroit, but those seem on hold as well, even barring a line-sale, until the new locomotives and passenger equipment becomes available. So I give the chance of MDOT buying any of CSX from GRR to DET at about 10% by 2025.
Those are my thoughts - again with no inside experience but plenty of observations in the last decade.
I was also thinking that New Orleans- Mongomery- Jacksonville would be a pretty good line for someone...
Should be a valuable line, if not for CSX.
I'm sure N.S. will have something to say about N.J., since it owns half of Conrail Shared Assets.
My guesses for Ohio:
Branchlines from Sterling on the old B&O main to Lorain and Cleveland;
Branchline from the Ohio River through Marrieta to Relief;
Mainline from Galion to Columbus;
Mainline from Toledo to Kenton; and l
Longer term if service changes are made the mainline from Cincinnati to St. Louis. Get your bids in soon.
Over and out,
Lou
Maybe the old Western Maryland "Dutch Line" from Baltimore to Hagerstown? Maryland Midland (now Genessee and Wyoming) tried to buy that line years ago. MMID connects to it on both ends so it might make sense.
If I was EHH I would spin lines off to an LLC short line conglomerate much like the INRD is now, wholly owned by CSXT. This would allow different operating requirements, rules and expectations without affecting the parent companies standing on/with Wall Street and the new conglomerate would not be publicly traded. In essence make two out of one. All the gymnastics of valuation, bidding, negotiations are avoided. Put all the wood from the trunk of the tree in one pile and the wood from the branches in another. You still own all the wood.
acmatth Maybe the old Western Maryland "Dutch Line" from Baltimore to Hagerstown? Maryland Midland (now Genessee and Wyoming) tried to buy that line years ago. MMID connects to it on both ends so it might make sense.
On Sunday one week ago I was dining with a friend who was a former Conrail operator and a long time WM fan who related that he had heard from some railfans (just railfan rumors/speculations?) that the Dutch line was on the block for divestuture. Our meal was at a country B & B that abutts the Dutch line and, to add a touch of emphasis, a train rumbled past, something I had never seen before and any of our previous Sunday feasts. He was surprised since he had believed that there were no scheduled trains on Sundays. I was able to get a tiny glimpse of the westbound movement which consisted of mixed freight, and seemed a decent size for a local (which I assumed it was).
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