Amtrk Senate Debate

[TomDiehl]

As I also said above, no doubt the cost of maintaining passenger equipment is higher than that of freight equipment. Of much less doubt is that a freight diesel-electric locomotive has any significantly different maintenance requirements than a diesel-electric passenger locomotive.

Exactly what I was saying. However, trying to compare the the number of maintenance people that work for a freight railroad to the number that work for a passenger railroad is not valid because the jobs they do and the parts that need to be maintained are too different.

The locomotives for either type railroad are fairly similar, but the numbers Oltmand was quoting did not break down loco and car maintenance personnel numbers.

Then you can project the numbers another step: if the number of trains that either one operated was to double, would the number of maintenance people also double? Is the current numbers because of the different jobs they need to do, the number of locations they need to support with maintenance, or the quantity of cars and locos they have to maintain? His comparison was based strictly on the quantity part of the question.

So, what all those Amtrak Mechanical folk are doing is "not much" but you believe it's all about economy of scale and craft division of labor?

Economy of scale and labor constraints as the cause of horrible productivity are both the responsibility of Amtrak management.  What incentive has Amtrak management had to improve either?  Almost none, so Amtrak remains a mess.  Lousy productivity is lousy productivity regardless of the cause.

You still don't get it.

It's about your flawed comparison of a freight railroad to a passenger railroad and the maintenance requirements of each.

I never said that I thought Amtrak's maintenance Department was properly staffed, over staffed, or understaffed. I simply stated the comparison of the job the two have to do is so different, any comparison of that type is invalid.

[oltmannd]

As I also said above, no doubt the cost of maintaining passenger equipment is higher than that of freight equipment. Of much less doubt is that a freight diesel-electric locomotive has any significantly different maintenance requirements than a diesel-electric passenger locomotive.

Exactly what I was saying. However, trying to compare the the number of maintenance people that work for a freight railroad to the number that work for a passenger railroad is not valid because the jobs they do and the parts that need to be maintained are too different.

The locomotives for either type railroad are fairly similar, but the numbers Oltmand was quoting did not break down loco and car maintenance personnel numbers.

Then you can project the numbers another step: if the number of trains that either one operated was to double, would the number of maintenance people also double? Is the current numbers because of the different jobs they need to do, the number of locations they need to support with maintenance, or the quantity of cars and locos they have to maintain? His comparison was based strictly on the quantity part of the question.

So, what all those Amtrak Mechanical folk are doing is "not much" but you believe it's all about economy of scale and craft division of labor?

Economy of scale and labor constraints as the cause of horrible productivity are both the responsibility of Amtrak management.  What incentive has Amtrak management had to improve either?  Almost none, so Amtrak remains a mess.  Lousy productivity is lousy productivity regardless of the cause.

[TomDiehl]

As I also said above, no doubt the cost of maintaining passenger equipment is higher than that of freight equipment. Of much less doubt is that a freight diesel-electric locomotive has any significantly different maintenance requirements than a diesel-electric passenger locomotive.

Exactly what I was saying. However, trying to compare the the number of maintenance people that work for a freight railroad to the number that work for a passenger railroad is not valid because the jobs they do and the parts that need to be maintained are too different.

The locomotives for either type railroad are fairly similar, but the numbers Oltmand was quoting did not break down loco and car maintenance personnel numbers.

Then you can project the numbers another step: if the number of trains that either one operated was to double, would the number of maintenance people also double? Is the current numbers because of the different jobs they need to do, the number of locations they need to support with maintenance, or the quantity of cars and locos they have to maintain? His comparison was based strictly on the quantity part of the question.

[MichaelSol]

So you're saying that the number of personnel needed to maintain and prepare a passenger car should be the same as the number needed to do the same with a freight car?

(from your earlier post) Compare Amtrak to BN,

No. I am saying what I said I said: 18x the number sounds high.

You're still trying to compare a freight railroad to a passenger railroad, which is still invalid whether your talking about BNSF or NS or D-L.

Which was also the original discussion.

Actually we are talking about maintenance of equipment. And, as my earlier post points out, we have plenty of data available because the freight railroads were also passenger railroads, and provided detailed data under ICC accounting for both absolute and relative costs of maintaining different types of equipment.

As I also said above, no doubt the cost of maintaining passenger equipment is higher than that of freight equipment. Of much less doubt is that a freight diesel-electric locomotive has any significantly different maintenance requirements than a diesel-electric passenger locomotive.

A passenger car costs money to maintain. So does a diesel-electric locomotive. Historically, a relatively new diesel-electric locomotive costs about three times as much annually in maintenance and repairs as the average older railway passenger car. I am taking this from a point in time when the primary cost involved was labor. The cost of maintaining a freight car is a pittance by comparison to a passenger car, but we can eliminate any consideration of the freight car, as Don Oltmann attempted to do for you above, by specifically comparing a more complex machine -- the diesel electric locomotive -- which 1) is shared by both the passenger and freight railroads, and 2) for which we have a lengthy record of absolute and relative maintenance costs to compare with passenger car maintenance, and which therefore provides a useful surrogate.

Based on that rule of thumb, and eliminating entirely any comparison with modern freight car equipment, if BN can maintain a locomotive fleet of 6,300 locomotives with 7,300 employees, Amtrak should be able to maintain its 475 locomotives and 2,100 passenger cars with 1,362 employees.

That's still high, but it provides a coarse estimate.

 

[TomDiehl]

So you're saying that the number of personnel needed to maintain and prepare a passenger car should be the same as the number needed to do the same with a freight car?

(from your earlier post) Compare Amtrak to BN,

No. I am saying what I said I said: 18x the number sounds high.

You're still trying to compare a freight railroad to a passenger railroad, which is still invalid whether your talking about BNSF or NS or D-L.

Which was also the original discussion.

[MichaelSol]

So you're saying that the number of personnel needed to maintain and prepare a passenger car should be the same as the number needed to do the same with a freight car?

No. I am saying what I said I said: 18x the number sounds high.

[TomDiehl]

No, but taking one sentence out of context can be misinterpreted. It was part of a statement pointing out that a comparison between a freight railroad, serving only a fraction of the country is not a valid comparison to a passenger railroad serving most of the country and mostly on trackage it does not own.

Whoa, "serving most of the country" is a broad generality without any particular economic meaning.

90% of Amtrak's service is limited to just seven relatively small North Eastern states. It has two heavy repair facilities in that region, and one in Indiana. It needs 4,000 employees to service a total of 2,566 locomotives and cars in those three facilities. It is, in fact, highly centralized because the vast bulk of its services cover a relatively small geographical area. You might presume efficiency from the high degree of centralization.

Compare Amtrak to BN, BN is spread all over. It covers over 20 states to obtain 90% of its revenue. They are mostly big states with lots of heavy territory. BN uses 7,341 employees to service nearly 90,000 locomotives and rail transportation equipment in 8 heavy repair facilities and 46 car repair and locomotive running repair facilities. It is highly decentralized. You might presume a degree of inefficiency by duplication in so many facilities. The average BN locomotive is 15 years old. Notwithstanding the nice paint jobs, those are not spring chickens pulling those heavy trains. They require maintenance. BN has 6,300 of these hard working veteran locomotives alone, that's 15 times the number of Amtrak locomotives and three times the entire equipment fleet of Amtrak, cars and locomotives combined.

The average rolling stock at BN is close to 20 years old, used heavily in an abusive environment. At 81,000 units, that is 38 times the number of units that Amtrak uses to produce its revenue.

On a weighted average basis, the BN statistically is a far larger operation geographically than Amtrak. In addition, BN operates 32,000 route miles with 1,500 trains a day. Amtrak operates 22,000 route miles with 265 trains per day.

On a per unit of production basis, Amtrak requires 18 times the number of employees for equipment maintenance as BN.

That's high. 

 

So you're saying that the number of personnel needed to maintain and prepare a passenger car should be the same as the number needed to do the same with a freight car?

[MichaelSol]

I agree that a comparison between BN and Amtrak might give one a better picture. However, I still don't think we are getting a complete picture.  Perhaps someone's suggestion about comparing what we would like to see from Amtrak to European counterparts is really valid.  There seem to be many key differences between the freight operations and the passenger ones, which perhaps we haven't clearly identified.

We do have a very good basis for comparison: U.S. Railroads.

Prior to 1970, when railroads were attributing everything they could to passenger service expense to justify abandonment, a good tightly run passenger operation like CNW's could generate a 99% operating ratio, a  more general mixed long distance carrier like Milwaukee Road, with a commuter mix, long distance, and night train operations resembling that of Amtrak's, around 130%. A very poorly situated passenger operation, like Great Northern's, would soar up to 200%.

What those numbers show is that, by and large, it cost twice as much to operate a passenger service as a freight service, and that represents a combination of higher maintenance costs for the equipment, higher overhead for personnel in general, and general operating costs not present in a freight operations, food, menus and doillies and things like that.

Amtrak's 22,000 employees, supporting the operation of a mere 2,566 pieces of equipment distributed among 265 trains per day suggests the scope of the problem. From an economic perspective, U.S. Passenger Rail Service is less efficient now than it was 40 years ago, even as U.S. Freight Railroads have become far more efficient.

 

[MichaelSol]

---

A general question.  Do Amtrak's employment figures someone quoted earlier in the discussion include the CSR side of things (ticket agents, baggage handlers, etc)?

Amtrak, operating 265 trains a day, has 22,000 total employees. BN, operating 1,500 trains a day, has 40,000 employees.

[AmtrakRider]

robscaboose,

Let me see if I understand you clearly.  You are saying that at the turnaround point for each train Amtrak runs, they need at least 12 persons to maintain the engine and an additional 10 to 12 persons for the rest of the maintainance and the preparation for the outbound service.  This is the minumum Amtrak can realistically work with to have the train ready in a reasonable amount of time.  And this number can be higher depending on the state of individual train sets.

---

A general question.  Do Amtrak's employment figures someone quoted earlier in the discussion include the CSR side of things (ticket agents, baggage handlers, etc)?

[Paul Milenkovic]

Does Amtrak actually uncouple the locomotive as part of the process of turning trains?  I guess they may do that for the Empire Builder, but I was under the impression that the push-pull Hiawatha train stayed with its locomotive in the manner of a Metra commuter train.

I have been told that fixed consists are the rule with the corridor trains as the coach yards have been sold to real estate developers and that adding or subtracting cars from a consist to reflect demand is too labor intensive.  Hence while varying the length of a passenger consist is considered a selling point of conventional railroading in meeting varying demand, Amtrak operates corridor trains as if they were semi-permanently coupled Talgo sets.

From Model Railroader ads and articles about commuter gallery bi-level models, I got the impression that Metra does some switching -- they have the locomotive facing the outbound direction from Olgivie Center or Union Station, and they put a cab car midway in the consist that they can uncouple the tail cars of the train to come up with a shortened consist for off-peak operation -- do they just leave the string of cars in the station or do they have a switch engine to take those cars to a yard some place?  So I guess Metra varies their consists to meet varying demand, but Amtrak doesn't have that option on trains requiring a cabbage car at the terminal end unless they would do more switching.

While commuter seats are flip-over and Amtrak coach seats could be turned by the crews, I understand that the Amtrak corridor push-pulls have half the seats oriented in each direction, so on a full train, half the passengers are riding backwards.  Some passengers are OK with that and many prefer to ride facing forward -- I remember riding CTA El trains in backward-facing seats, and there is this somewhat disconcerting visual illusion when the train stops that the view outside the window is still moving -- this may produce motion sickness symptoms in some people.

In addition to turning the locomotives, do they turn LD consists, not only that the seats are facing forward but that the baggage car is up front and that the sleepers, diner, lounge, and coaches are in the order they want?  I guess sleepers at the end of the train is a long tradition where first-class passengers have to walk less and coach passengers get to see more of the train when boarding.  Where do they turn passenger equipment in Chicago -- is there a wye track somewhere?  Is that wye track viewable from a safe and legal place as a railfan experience?

[AmtrakRider]

Michael,

I agree that a comparison between BN and Amtrak might give one a better picture. However, I still don't think we are getting a complete picture.  Perhaps someone's suggestion about comparing what we would like to see from Amtrak to European counterparts is really valid.  There seem to be many key differences between the freight operations and the passenger ones, which perhaps we haven't clearly identified.

[robscaboose]

Interesting reading so far.

How many people does it take to get a train ready and what are their responsibility's.

While I'm not saying Amtrak is efficient, these are some educated guesses from my observations in the tower in Chicago on getting a train ready. 

When a train arrives at it's final destination, the train is taken to the yard for inspection - 2 or 3 people (engineer/hostler, brakemen and or flag on the rear of train)  The engine is cut off for it's own inspection & maintenance so any additional moving of cars in the yard requires a yard engine & crew.

Engine - electrical & mechanical inspection & repair, (different crafts = 2-3 people minimum)

• Engine is washed, fueled, sand, holding tank emptied, water added, cab cleaned, ice & drinking water provided (2-3+ people)
• Any light repairs made 2-3+ people.  Presently Amtrak is a tight on power & cars, so trains are usually on a tight turn around schedule.  Because of that they want sufficient number of people to make the repairs and get the unit back out in service.  (plus railroad stuff is big & heavy. you try picking coil spring or piece of brake rigging by yourself)

Servicing of cars -

• Inspection  2+ (mechanical & electrical crafts)
• Light repairs (multiple crafts - Depending on the season - more problems occur in the winter under a car than summer, plus if a problem is due to ice or snow build up, it needs to be thawed out before repairs can be made
• Cleaning (4+ for a 8- 10 train / 4-5 hrs max per train)
• Restocking of supplies (2- 3 people)

 Rebuilding of the train

         Switch engine (engineer/hostler) 1-2 brakemen to

• Rebuild the train
• Inspect train
• Conduct a terminal brake test
• Add road engine & back train down to the platform

 

Beech Grove & Delaware are the two major rebuild facilities for Amtrak  They do in all the heavy repairs on the cars & engines, including rebuilds from wrecks.  Heavy repairs require that the engine or car is basically gutted & then rebuilt.  I was lucky enough to get a tour of Beach Grove several yrs ago & was quite impressed.  Every x number of years they gut each engine and car and rebuild it from the wheels up.  With the high percentage of the fleet being used on a daily basis, the backlog of deferred maintance & the fact that no new passenger cars have been purchased in a long time, you see why they are labor intensive.  It takes alot more work on a daily basis to put a 30+ yr old passenger in service than a 30+ yr old box car.

Rob

PS  It doesn't take as many people to service the relatively new fleet of RR locomotives being used these days.  

[MichaelSol]

No, but taking one sentence out of context can be misinterpreted. It was part of a statement pointing out that a comparison between a freight railroad, serving only a fraction of the country is not a valid comparison to a passenger railroad serving most of the country and mostly on trackage it does not own.

Whoa, "serving most of the country" is a broad generality without any particular economic meaning.

90% of Amtrak's service is limited to just seven relatively small North Eastern states. It has two heavy repair facilities in that region, and one in Indiana. It needs 4,000 employees to service a total of 2,566 locomotives and cars in those three facilities. It is, in fact, highly centralized because the vast bulk of its services cover a relatively small geographical area. You might presume efficiency from the high degree of centralization.

Compare Amtrak to BN, BN is spread all over. It covers over 20 states to obtain 90% of its revenue. They are mostly big states with lots of heavy territory. BN uses 7,341 employees to service nearly 90,000 locomotives and rail transportation equipment in 8 heavy repair facilities and 46 car repair and locomotive running repair facilities. It is highly decentralized. You might presume a degree of inefficiency by duplication in so many facilities. The average BN locomotive is 15 years old. Notwithstanding the nice paint jobs, those are not spring chickens pulling those heavy trains. They require maintenance. BN has 6,300 of these hard working veteran locomotives alone, that's 15 times the number of Amtrak locomotives and three times the entire equipment fleet of Amtrak, cars and locomotives combined.

The average rolling stock at BN is close to 20 years old, used heavily in an abusive environment. At 81,000 units, that is 38 times the number of units that Amtrak uses to produce its revenue.

On a weighted average basis, the BN statistically is a far larger operation geographically than Amtrak. In addition, BN operates 32,000 route miles with 1,500 trains a day. Amtrak operates 22,000 route miles with 265 trains per day.

On a per unit of production basis, Amtrak requires 18 times the number of employees for equipment maintenance as BN.

That's high. 

At Milwaukee Road, passenger required about 6 times the number of maintenance workers as the freight side, per unit of operation.

[TomDiehl]

Only Amtrak's heavy maintenance facility is centralized. Inspection and maintenance crews need to be available all over the national system.

So what you are saying is that the nature of the product requires a massive reduplication of skills across the country not required for other transportation modes.

In essence, then, the only way for Amtrak to make it is to develop the "corridor" approach people have talked about here before, with, if possible, a hefty increase in fees for LD trains since they would now become "tourist" trains.

No, but taking one sentence out of context can be misinterpreted. It was part of a statement pointing out that a comparison between a freight railroad, serving only a fraction of the country is not a valid comparison to a passenger railroad serving most of the country and mostly on trackage it does not own.

[AmtrakRider]

Only Amtrak's heavy maintenance facility is centralized. Inspection and maintenance crews need to be available all over the national system.

So what you are saying is that the nature of the product requires a massive reduplication of skills across the country not required for other transportation modes.

In essence, then, the only way for Amtrak to make it is to develop the "corridor" approach people have talked about here before, with, if possible, a hefty increase in fees for LD trains since they would now become "tourist" trains.

[AmtrakRider]

Amtrak has 18,500 employees (8700 employed on trains or in stations)

Assuming that is correct, it really bothers me.  Sure, people are needed for repairs in the shops, train cleaning in the yards, and MOW on the relatively short portion of the tracks owned by Amtrak.  But what is it that those 10,000 people are doing?

Does anyone have a more detailed analysis of the headcount by function?   

I don't know if anyone else has asked this, but I'd also like to know how many of the additional 10,000 workers are "full time" as opposed to part time workers.  How much of the work they do is centralized, as opposed to spread out?

[oltmannd]

I am disturbed also by the comparison (in part because of the long history of featherbedding within the railroad industry that Amtrak inherited), but I agree most of us do not have nearly enough data to make a decision regarding the validity of the comparison.  The problem here is that we all know a passenger car would require more maintenance than, say, a coal gondola, but we have nothing to measure the extent.

If anyone had any numbers regarding the maintenance employees of one of the big commuter operations that might serve as an additional point of reference in this matter.

A further complication is the extent to which a private railroad such as NS has contracted out some portion of the maintenance work as compared to Amtrak. 

NS does not contract out any locomotive maintenance and does all of their own backshop work - same as Amtrak.

I would be very interested in finding out the number of employees need to maintain equipment at VRE or Trinity.  I would suspect a "legacy" commuter agency like NJT, MN or SEPTA is contaminated with the same disease as Amtrak - in fact, I've seen it first hand....

[oltmannd]

Here are some high (low?) lights.

There's a small mountain of people in mechanical ~4000.  By comparison, NS has about 1000 and the number or locomotives and cars Amtrak has is less than the number of locomotives NS has.....and NS has to inspect and lace up a few hundred thousand frt cars a week, to boot.

 

Unfortunately, you forget what you're comparing. How many of those NS freight cars have heating and air conditioning? Just to name an obvious difference.

A boxcar load of washing machines or a hopper full of coal doesn't require climate control, lighting, food, etc. that the human "cargo" requires.

Did you miss the part where I mentioned that NS has more LOCOMOTIVES than Amtrak has locomotive and cars combined!  So, unless you believe taking care of a passenger car is 4x more labor intensive than keeping after a locomotive, what, exactly are those 4000 guys doing all day long?

I didn't miss anything, in fact it was even quoted above. The mechanical maintenance crews required for maintaining freight cars would only cover the shell of a passenger car. What I did say is maintaining a passenger car is more than four times more involved than maintaining a freight car. Add to that the NS doesn't cover the whole country, so they can centralize more easily. Only Amtrak's heavy maintenance facility is centralized. Inspection and maintenance crews need to be available all over the national system.

In addition to the points I mentioned above, the furnishings need to be maintained, linens need to be removed and washed, supplies need to be replenished. A car load of washing machines isn't going to complain about a door that rattles or is drafty, or a torn or stained carpet.

Forget the freight cars.

Lets just compare a locomotive to a passenger car since NS has more of them than Amtrak has cars plus locos. 

If you assume that the mechanical maintenance of a locomotive = that of a passenger car, then you 're still left with an additional 3000 people who's sole job is to clean 1000 coaches  and do the laundry for a couple hundred rooms every day. 

 Come on.  Just give me something remotely plausible....

So you failed to make the point that a passenger car and a freight car have comparable amounts of maintenance to be done to them.

Your argument has gone from incomplete to ridiculous. Comparing locomotives to any type of car is nowhere near "plausible." The only similarity of one to the other is they both have flanged wheels spaced 56.5 inches apart and couplers to hold them together. Locomotives have 2 to 4 seats, passenger cars have a lot more than that. Locomotives have diesel engines and generators, cars consume power. Freight cars only consume it to be pulled, passenger cars need to be pulled AND provided with electrical power, but you've alread conceeded the freight/passenger car argument. Do I need to go on?

You seem to be the only one interpreting that statment to mean that they have 3000 car cleaners and laundry people. You choose to completely ignore the fact that there's a lot more to maintaining the interior of a passenger car than there is a freight car. More work and jobs to do=more people to do it.

So, you think Amtrak's 4000 person Mechanical Dept is reasonably staffed?  You're the only one so far.  I, for the life of me, can't figure out what all those guys are doing.

 BTW, I do have a good bit of professional experience in locomotive and passenger car design and maintenance.....

A locomotive may be an apple and a passenger car an orange, but they're both 1/4 lb and hae 200 calories....

Reasonable staffing size is not the point you were making in your first statement, quoted above. You were comparing the number of maintenance section personnel for a freight railroad, confined to the south and central eastern part of the US, to a passenger railroad that covers the entire US.

Your comparison of the two was the major flaw, and you conceeded the point that passenger cars have more work to be done to them than freight cars.

To pick out another flaw in your comparison, you also didn't compare average age of the fleet, cars to cars or locos to locos.

And most passenger cars weigh more than freight cars, so it would be more "apples to watermellons."

Is this the 5 minute argument or the full half hour?

That would depend on how many flaws in your comparison I need to point out.

You've yet to find one, or even an ally. 

&

-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)