Railroad M&As?
The appropriate CO avatar would be Janus.
How about:
https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1332370583137509376/7iRuAuNw.jpg
charlie hebdo The appropriate CO avatar would be Janus.
the image won't show even though on Google.
If the motivation behind such crew reductions and "redeployments" is the spector of driverless trucks, let me assure that truly autonomous (driverless) trucks are still a long way off. And even so, the technology to bring about total automation will be expensive and make the cost of implementing PTC look like chump change in comparison. Sure, the internet is full of videos showing "look no hands!" driving on the highway... but there are very few (and I haven't found any) of a tractor trailer blindside backing itself off a crowded street, down a sloped alley and into a narrow dock.. hmm. I wonder why that is. One typical big city neighbourhood that springs to mind is Saint Henri in Montreal.. I would love to see a truck navigate itself through those crowded streets not to mention backing itself around parked cars and into a 1920s era dock. Driverless trucks are the boogieman being used to negotiate one person crews on trains. I'm not a railroader and thus have no dog in that fight, but labor is a much bigger chunk of the trucking pie than it is of the railroads' pie.. and we in trucking would consider an OR of 85 heaven.. 90 good.. 95..nothing to see here.. we're making money. It's not as simple or cheap as swapping Billy The Driver out for some software from Bestbuy.
charlie hebdothe image won't show even though on Google.
Well, let's keep it about trains. I detect the natives getting restless.
try this two faced locomotive
Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place. No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition.. The only economy of scale for monster trains is moving more cars per crew cost. Otherwise, monster trains cost more to operate due to more mechanical problems and delays. So, if you reduce or eliminate the crew, economic advantage of monster trains drops. If it drops low enough to not be able to offset the added cost of breakdowns and delays of monster trains, there will likely be no economic advantage to running them. Then too, the railroads will be in sharp competition with trucking with its fundamentally quicker delivery. If railroads want to take business from trucking, they will have to speed up their service. Monster trains slow down service. PSR style freights were not created to just cut crew cost. PSR cutting train starts created the side effect of cutting crew cost. You are not looking past the human element.. Some of the key features of PSR, RoW rationalization, and in theory increased capacity which has happened for the most part. Equimpent cost do not go away just because you eliminate a crew. Capacity cost do not go away just because you no longer have a crew. Car utilization cost does not go away just because you do not have a crew.. PSR has it's hiccups and will continue to have them as the focus on OR remains.. For now.. I do agree that there are more costs to railroading than just crew costs. But I don't see how a great increase in train size lowers those costs. It might if they were monster unit trains. You mention car utilization. How do monster trains lower the cost of car utilization? How do they lower the cost of capcity, as you say?
SD60MAC9500 Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place. No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition.. The only economy of scale for monster trains is moving more cars per crew cost. Otherwise, monster trains cost more to operate due to more mechanical problems and delays. So, if you reduce or eliminate the crew, economic advantage of monster trains drops. If it drops low enough to not be able to offset the added cost of breakdowns and delays of monster trains, there will likely be no economic advantage to running them. Then too, the railroads will be in sharp competition with trucking with its fundamentally quicker delivery. If railroads want to take business from trucking, they will have to speed up their service. Monster trains slow down service. PSR style freights were not created to just cut crew cost. PSR cutting train starts created the side effect of cutting crew cost. You are not looking past the human element.. Some of the key features of PSR, RoW rationalization, and in theory increased capacity which has happened for the most part. Equimpent cost do not go away just because you eliminate a crew. Capacity cost do not go away just because you no longer have a crew. Car utilization cost does not go away just because you do not have a crew.. PSR has it's hiccups and will continue to have them as the focus on OR remains.. For now..
Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place. No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition.. The only economy of scale for monster trains is moving more cars per crew cost. Otherwise, monster trains cost more to operate due to more mechanical problems and delays. So, if you reduce or eliminate the crew, economic advantage of monster trains drops. If it drops low enough to not be able to offset the added cost of breakdowns and delays of monster trains, there will likely be no economic advantage to running them. Then too, the railroads will be in sharp competition with trucking with its fundamentally quicker delivery. If railroads want to take business from trucking, they will have to speed up their service. Monster trains slow down service.
SD60MAC9500 Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place. No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition..
Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place.
So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place.
No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition..
The only economy of scale for monster trains is moving more cars per crew cost. Otherwise, monster trains cost more to operate due to more mechanical problems and delays. So, if you reduce or eliminate the crew, economic advantage of monster trains drops. If it drops low enough to not be able to offset the added cost of breakdowns and delays of monster trains, there will likely be no economic advantage to running them. Then too, the railroads will be in sharp competition with trucking with its fundamentally quicker delivery. If railroads want to take business from trucking, they will have to speed up their service. Monster trains slow down service.
PSR style freights were not created to just cut crew cost. PSR cutting train starts created the side effect of cutting crew cost. You are not looking past the human element.. Some of the key features of PSR, RoW rationalization, and in theory increased capacity which has happened for the most part. Equimpent cost do not go away just because you eliminate a crew. Capacity cost do not go away just because you no longer have a crew. Car utilization cost does not go away just because you do not have a crew.. PSR has it's hiccups and will continue to have them as the focus on OR remains.. For now..
I do agree that there are more costs to railroading than just crew costs. But I don't see how a great increase in train size lowers those costs. It might if they were monster unit trains. You mention car utilization. How do monster trains lower the cost of car utilization? How do they lower the cost of capcity, as you say?
The increase in size creates capacity with the rolling stock instead of CAPEX going toward the physical plant. PSR pre/swap blocking keeps cars moving instead of dwelling in a terminal. Boxcars for example probably only get 1 turn a month. If PSR can double that to 2 turns a month then you lower the cost associated with your boxcar as its greater velocity creates more capacity and improves on the ROI in your boxcar fleet. The more loads you can get per month means less idle time sitting empty not producing revenue miles.
SD60MAC9500The increase in size creates capacity with the rolling stock instead of CAPEX going toward the physical plant. PSR pre/swap blocking keeps cars moving instead of dwelling in a terminal. Boxcars for example probably only get 1 turn a month. If PSR can double that to 2 turns a month then you lower the cost associated with your boxcar as its greater velocity creates more capacity and improves on the ROI in your boxcar fleet. The more loads you can get per month means less idle time sitting empty not producing revenue miles.
Block swapping is a false economy - in most cases - railroads have one movement per day between the various origins and the various destinations. If, for whatever reasons, a train does not make the schedule pick up of a block it is delayed 24 hours or more - just as if it had gone to a terminal and had missed its connection. Additionally by not working through a terminal, it does not get the mechanical inspection and attention of the terminal.
If the block swapping takes place at a line of road wayside location - the switching necessary for the block swapping and necessary air tests will greatly eat into the capacity one thinks they have created with the oversized trains.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Improved velocity is theoretically what enables a railroad to improve car utilization. The faster a car moves loaded, the faster it can be emptied and set into another customer for loading. If PSR actually worked that way...
As mentioned elsewhere, my son works for a Class 1 in train service. It has become a weekly occurrence for him - either as part of the originating crew or as part of a relief crew, to be called because a train couldn't cover one crew district within 12 hours. His employer will burn two crews to cover less than 100 miles and three crews to cover less than 150. And it hasn't been at all unusual for a relief crew to sit for a full 12 hours before being relieved themselves. And the delays associated with these re-crews translate into slower transit times and degraded velocity.
I have come to believe that PSR attempts to juggle so many "balls of change" that they all end up being dropped.
CW
BaltACD SD60MAC9500 The increase in size creates capacity with the rolling stock instead of CAPEX going toward the physical plant. PSR pre/swap blocking keeps cars moving instead of dwelling in a terminal. Boxcars for example probably only get 1 turn a month. If PSR can double that to 2 turns a month then you lower the cost associated with your boxcar as its greater velocity creates more capacity and improves on the ROI in your boxcar fleet. The more loads you can get per month means less idle time sitting empty not producing revenue miles. Block swapping is a false economy - in most cases - railroads have one movement per day between the various origins and the various destinations. If, for whatever reasons, a train does not make the schedule pick up of a block it is delayed 24 hours or more - just as if it had gone to a terminal and had missed its connection. Additionally by not working through a terminal, it does not get the mechanical inspection and attention of the terminal. If the block swapping takes place at a line of road wayside location - the switching necessary for the block swapping and necessary air tests will greatly eat into the capacity one thinks they have created with the oversized trains.
SD60MAC9500 The increase in size creates capacity with the rolling stock instead of CAPEX going toward the physical plant. PSR pre/swap blocking keeps cars moving instead of dwelling in a terminal. Boxcars for example probably only get 1 turn a month. If PSR can double that to 2 turns a month then you lower the cost associated with your boxcar as its greater velocity creates more capacity and improves on the ROI in your boxcar fleet. The more loads you can get per month means less idle time sitting empty not producing revenue miles.
Good point JM.
To borrow a book title about the collapse of two once prominent lines, that's "No way to run a railroad."
Juniata Man Improved velocity is theoretically what enables a railroad to improve car utilization. The faster a car moves loaded, the faster it can be emptied and set into another customer for loading. If PSR actually worked that way... As mentioned elsewhere, my son works for a Class 1 in train service. It has become a weekly occurrence for him - either as part of the originating crew or as part of a relief crew, to be called because a train couldn't cover one crew district within 12 hours. His employer will burn two crews to cover less than 100 miles and three crews to cover less than 150. And it hasn't been at all unusual for a relief crew to sit for a full 12 hours before being relieved themselves. And the delays associated with these re-crews translate into slower transit times and degraded velocity. I have come to believe that PSR attempts to juggle so many "balls of change" that they all end up being dropped. CW
I am by no means a fan of PSR, but my own observation of recrews on the local NS Decatur-KC line is that there are far more days when things run to plan than not. So in a given week, month, or quarter there's a huge number of crew starts that have been eliminated.
And, frankly, before PSR there were lots of days when things went to Hades in a Handbasket with recrews. Things have never run very smoothly on the railroads that I have observed over the last 40 years. Why do you think so many customers have bailed over the years? The ones that are left are forced to stay due to the transportation economics of the goods that they ship.
ns145 Juniata Man Improved velocity is theoretically what enables a railroad to improve car utilization. The faster a car moves loaded, the faster it can be emptied and set into another customer for loading. If PSR actually worked that way... As mentioned elsewhere, my son works for a Class 1 in train service. It has become a weekly occurrence for him - either as part of the originating crew or as part of a relief crew, to be called because a train couldn't cover one crew district within 12 hours. His employer will burn two crews to cover less than 100 miles and three crews to cover less than 150. And it hasn't been at all unusual for a relief crew to sit for a full 12 hours before being relieved themselves. And the delays associated with these re-crews translate into slower transit times and degraded velocity. I have come to believe that PSR attempts to juggle so many "balls of change" that they all end up being dropped. CW I am by no means a fan of PSR, but my own observation of recrews on the local NS Decatur-KC line is there are far more days when things run to plan than not. So in a given week, month, or quarter there's a huge number of crew starts that have been eliminated. And, frankly, before PSR there were lots of days when things went to Hades in a Handbasket with recrews. Things have never run very smoothly on the railroads that I have observed over the last 40 years. Why do you think so many customers have bailed over the years? The ones that are left are forced to stay due to the transportation economics of the goods that they ship.
I am by no means a fan of PSR, but my own observation of recrews on the local NS Decatur-KC line is there are far more days when things run to plan than not. So in a given week, month, or quarter there's a huge number of crew starts that have been eliminated.
When I was working I had access to system wide recrew reports for CSX. I put together a simple system to keep track of them by division. The last year I worked (2016) there were in excess of 20K recrews for the year, down from over 32K in 2015.
The biggest cause of recrews was congestion on individual territories. When a area became congested, recrews for that area increased exponentially.
SD60MAC9500 Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid SD60MAC9500 Euclid So U.P. plans on one ground roving conductor in charge of several autonomous trains with no human engineers. This will abruptly end the era of monster trains and their broken knuckles, which will be good news to the roving conductors. This will be the ultimate solution to the war between labor and management over crew size. It will also be the ultimate solution to the crew fatigue problem by allowing the roving conductors to rove closer to home, so they can sleep at home every night. It will also usher in the era of short, fast, and frequent trains with their agility and flexibility to live up to the true implication of Precision Scheduled Railroading. Finally all the pieces fall into place. No it won't. Trains size will not be reduced under automonous operation. Even with a "crewless" train you'll want to keep economies of scale in your favor to remain in competition.. The only economy of scale for monster trains is moving more cars per crew cost. Otherwise, monster trains cost more to operate due to more mechanical problems and delays. So, if you reduce or eliminate the crew, economic advantage of monster trains drops. If it drops low enough to not be able to offset the added cost of breakdowns and delays of monster trains, there will likely be no economic advantage to running them. Then too, the railroads will be in sharp competition with trucking with its fundamentally quicker delivery. If railroads want to take business from trucking, they will have to speed up their service. Monster trains slow down service. PSR style freights were not created to just cut crew cost. PSR cutting train starts created the side effect of cutting crew cost. You are not looking past the human element.. Some of the key features of PSR, RoW rationalization, and in theory increased capacity which has happened for the most part. Equimpent cost do not go away just because you eliminate a crew. Capacity cost do not go away just because you no longer have a crew. Car utilization cost does not go away just because you do not have a crew.. PSR has it's hiccups and will continue to have them as the focus on OR remains.. For now.. I do agree that there are more costs to railroading than just crew costs. But I don't see how a great increase in train size lowers those costs. It might if they were monster unit trains. You mention car utilization. How do monster trains lower the cost of car utilization? How do they lower the cost of capcity, as you say? The increase in size creates capacity with the rolling stock instead of CAPEX going toward the physical plant. PSR pre/swap blocking keeps cars moving instead of dwelling in a terminal. Boxcars for example probably only get 1 turn a month. If PSR can double that to 2 turns a month then you lower the cost associated with your boxcar as its greater velocity creates more capacity and improves on the ROI in your boxcar fleet. The more loads you can get per month means less idle time sitting empty not producing revenue miles.
I agree with all your points about striving for the best plant utilization. Get the best productivity out of the investment. But why run one 300-car train rather than three 100-car trains? Where are the statistics that show that the longer the train is, the more productive it is? Why would increasing the number of cars in one train make those cars more productive, or increase track capacity, as you say?
What I am hearing about monster trains breaking knuckles, suffering delays, waiting for track space, running out of crew time, etc. leads me to conclude that plant productivity drops as trains get longer. The only point where productivity increases is that the number of cars in one train can be increased indefinitely without adding more crewmembers. So, the crewmember cost per car drops as trains get longer. Yet this one benefit is not nearly enough to offset the ponderous disruption and unforeseen complications of running monster trains.
I believe the best way to increase plant productivity is to revert to shorter trains, and more of them. Shorter trains flow with the plant productivity capacity. Monster trains disrupt the flow. Shorter, faster trains also provide the best customer service, which was one of the great selling points of PSR before the industry redefined it.
Automation, and PTC, will work together to increase track utilization by running more trains closer together. This is the modern method knocking at the door of old thinking.
Trains Forum members, please enjoy your now name-game-free thread.
Also, I want back the hour it took to accomplish that. Oh, how I miss the "delete post and all children posts" function. Sigh...
--Steven Otte, Model Railroader senior associate editorsotte@kalmbach.com
Thank you Steven! VERY much appreciated!
BALT; in our area it's a combination of yard congestion and mechanical issues - both locomotive and with individual cars in a train. Which goes directly to your earlier comment that that block swapping can negatively impact railcar mechanical inspections. And I'll blame psr for reducing locomotive mechanical shop forces with the resulting negative impact on locomotive servicing.
Juniata Man Thank you Steven! VERY much appreciated! BALT; in our area it's a combination of yard congestion and mechanical issues - both locomotive and with individual cars in a train. Which goes directly to your earlier comment that that block swapping can negatively impact railcar mechanical inspections. And I'll blame psr for reducing locomotive mechanical shop forces with the resulting negative impact on locomotive servicing. CW
I don't know if it's PSR or just bean counters, but maintenance on wheels seems to be getting much worse here along the UP West line. Metra too. So many flat spots..
charlie hebdo Juniata Man Thank you Steven! VERY much appreciated! BALT; in our area it's a combination of yard congestion and mechanical issues - both locomotive and with individual cars in a train. Which goes directly to your earlier comment that that block swapping can negatively impact railcar mechanical inspections. And I'll blame psr for reducing locomotive mechanical shop forces with the resulting negative impact on locomotive servicing. CW I don't know if it's PSR or just bean counters, but maineance on wheels seems to be getting much worse here along the UP West line. Metra too. So many flat-spot spots.
I don't know if it's PSR or just bean counters, but maineance on wheels seems to be getting much worse here along the UP West line. Metra too. So many flat-spot spots.
I can't really speak as to what has happened since CSX started EHH's form of PSR.
Before I retired, the WILD detector that was installed on my territory was capturing 3 or 4 Immediate Set Out cars per week and probably a dozen take to destination at a slower than track speed with the weels needing replacement at destination. Most all the cars that were being detected were loaded coal hoppers. What has happened in the past 4.5 years - I have no idea.
There appeqrs to be several items that allow the PSR metric to work. These come from posters who know much more than this poster.
1, Great dispatching meaning dispatchers are not overloaded.
2, Local traffic and switching needs to be off main line so it does not slow up regular trais. Note this is a biggie that is not very often able . Maybe why the Class 1s keep trying to eliminate many small shippers ?
3. Sidings need to be long enough to park the longest train on the district in question. 2 main tracks somewhat mitigate this but too many trains may mean a 3rd track needed on heavy grade sections. Or the power to weight ratio needs to be enough to keep a train running at track speeds.
4. There needs to be discipline for getting trains to meet the operating plan times.
5. Sidings need to be in a time distance depending on number of trains.
6. Special moves requiring slow or restrict speeds need to be planned for open track times.
7. the siding lengths and distance need to have enough flexibility to handle absolute work windows (AWWs). Lack of this is the reason the Crescent gets cancelled 4 days a week every Jan and Feb south of Atlanta.
8. Yards and block swapping locations need to be off the main unless no traffic for a certain tie of track access
EDIT from tree: Yards need enough lead and trailing sidings to meet longest trains to not block any main tracks.
Am sure others can come up with other points.
I have no direct proof of "Bad or flat-spotting of wheels" BUT... living close to the line; over the last few months, my perception is that we are'hearing' many more of them on the passing traffic. Particularly, since in the past they were not as obviously as noisey, and no-where, near the larger presence, as they seem to be currently.
My location is on a BNSF feeder line, leading to, and from, the Southern Transcon on BNSF [approx MP 127 on Main 3 Eldorado sub.]
blue streak 1 There appeqrs to be several items that allow the PSR metric to work. These come from posters who know much more than this poster. 1, Great dispatching meaning dispatchers are not overloaded. 2, Local traffic and switching needs to be off main line so it does not slow up regular trais. Note this is a biggie that is not very often able . Maybe why the Class 1s keep trying to eliminate many small shippers ? 3. Sidings need to be long enough to park the longest train on the district in question. 2 main tracks somewhat mitigate this but too many trains may mean a 3rd track needed on heavy grade sections. Or the power to weight ratio needs to be enough to keep a train running at track speeds. 4. There needs to be discipline for getting trains to meet the operating plan times. 5. Sidings need to be in a time distance depending on number of trains. 6. Special moves requiring slow or restrict speeds need to be planned for open track times. 7. the siding lengths and distance need to have enough flexibility to handle absolute work windows (AWWs). Lack of this is the reason the Crescent gets cancelled 4 days a week every Jan and Feb south of Atlanta. 8. Yards and block swapping locations need to be off the main unless no traffic for a certain tie of track access Am sure others can come up with other points.
This is a good list of the disadvantages of super long trains. I would add the point that these problems increase exponentially as train length increases. So the downsides of a 300-car train are greater than the sum of three 100-car trains.
Two other important items that should be added to the list are excessive blocking of grade crossings and excessive in-train forces that cause damage, delays, and endanger the public by raising the derailment potential.
Currently, there is investigation underway to determine whether a Federal mandate to limit train length should be imposed.
So why is the monster train philosophy so popular with railroad management?
There is only one reason, and that is that monster trains move more cars without increasing the labor needed to move shorter trains. So while management loves this because job reduction is in their interest; one more item to add to the list of downsides is that monster trains are job killers.
Job-killing is almost 100% the object of the game.
Still in training.
Unless I missed it, you missed a biggie - terminals need to be able to handle the long trains. Terminal dwell is a key metric.
Regular viewers at Deshler often see trains hung out due to limited siding lengths at South Deshler (~7000') unable to hold entire trains. This is especially constricting for the single track N-S Toledo Division.
The E-W line is double track, but still gets hung up. I've seen trains sitting on the main, basically parked.
And when Joe says "get the plunger out," it's usually because North Baltimore is stuffed to the gills. It's great for watching trains as the clog gets sorted out, but can't help the bottom line at all.
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...
Lithonia Operator Job-killing is almost 100% the object of the game.
Yes job killing is the one and only basic objective of running monster trains. But even at that, the largest part of the objective is using monster trains only as a symbolic gesture for the point of management winning their war with labor. It is only a symbolic gesture because it is obvious that even though monster trains eliminate labor, they do not eliminate enough to offset all of operational disadvantages to running monster trains.
Beyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains. That will win the war by ending the debate of whether to run one-person crews or two-person crews.
As the unions argue that two persons in the cab are needed for safety, the companies will argue that it is safest if the human crews are replaced by automation because it never gets fatigued or makes mistakes. And it always follows the rules.
EuclidBeyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains.
I'll disagree. Here's the real objective:
greyhounds Euclid Beyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains. I'll disagree. Here's the real objective: "For example, empire builder James J. Hill said in an interview with Frank L. McVey at the turn of the twentieth century 'that railroad income is based on ton miles and the expense of operation on train miles. The object is to get the highest rate [operating revenue] on the ton-mile and the smallest rate [operating expense] on the train mile.' In this statement is concentrated the theory of railroad management present day. (See the Ten Principles of Transportation Economics in Box 2.3, which is the authors’ more extended version of a theory of transportation economics and management such as James J. Hill had formulated.)" Gallamore, Robert E.. American Railroads . Harvard University Press. Kindle Edition.
Euclid Beyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains.
Wouldn't elimination of crews cut labor costs dramatically and thus the expense of operation?
charlie hebdo greyhounds Euclid Beyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains. I'll disagree. Here's the real objective: "For example, empire builder James J. Hill said in an interview with Frank L. McVey at the turn of the twentieth century 'that railroad income is based on ton miles and the expense of operation on train miles. The object is to get the highest rate [operating revenue] on the ton-mile and the smallest rate [operating expense] on the train mile.' In this statement is concentrated the theory of railroad management present day. (See the Ten Principles of Transportation Economics in Box 2.3, which is the authors’ more extended version of a theory of transportation economics and management such as James J. Hill had formulated.)" Gallamore, Robert E.. American Railroads . Harvard University Press. Kindle Edition. Wouldn't elimination of crews cut labor costs dramatically and thus the expense of operation?
Eliminating crews would cut cost.. but the as yet unproven technology that would allow their elimination wouldn't come for free either. Given that the technology isn't fully cooked, it is impossible to determine the true savings in making the transition.
The perfect corporation has one employee-the CEO, who just collects money and doesn't provide any goods or services.
Backshop The perfect corporation has one employee-the CEO, who just collects money and doesn't provide any goods or services.
And the rest simply try to employ as few people as possible.
Ulrich charlie hebdo greyhounds Euclid Beyond the symbolic objective of running monster trains, the real objective is to run crewless, autonomous trains. I'll disagree. Here's the real objective: "For example, empire builder James J. Hill said in an interview with Frank L. McVey at the turn of the twentieth century 'that railroad income is based on ton miles and the expense of operation on train miles. The object is to get the highest rate [operating revenue] on the ton-mile and the smallest rate [operating expense] on the train mile.' In this statement is concentrated the theory of railroad management present day. (See the Ten Principles of Transportation Economics in Box 2.3, which is the authors’ more extended version of a theory of transportation economics and management such as James J. Hill had formulated.)" Gallamore, Robert E.. American Railroads . Harvard University Press. Kindle Edition. Wouldn't elimination of crews cut labor costs dramatically and thus the expense of operation? Eliminating crews would cut cost.. but the as yet unproven technology that would allow their elimination wouldn't come for free either. Given that the technology isn't fully cooked, it is impossible to determine the true savings in making the transition.
The autonomous trains would be a capital investment, not an expense as labor would. Only maintenance would be expenses. The autonomous equipment would be depreciated.
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