EB mess

[CHamilton]

EB passengers will continue to be bussed between Seattle and Everett through Friday morning.

 

[Paulus]

In the first quarter of FY14, the Empire Builder arrived on time in Chicago 1.1% of the time. Which means only once.

 

[CHamilton]

BNSF Sees Bakken-Area Rail Tie-Up Lasting Until Year-End

BNSF Railway Co., the carrier owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will need the rest of 2014 to untangle train tie-ups in the corridor that serves North Dakota’s Bakken shale region.

A system-wide traffic jam, caused by surging grain and crude-oil volumes coupled with harsh weather, is being resolved on the southern lines linkingChicago and Los Angeles, Chief Executive Officer Carl Ice said yesterday in an interview at the railroad’s headquarters in Fort Worth,Texas....

Ice’s forecast underscored the scope of the recovery effort for U.S. railroads after winter storms and rising cargo shipments disrupted operations. BNSF sent 300 additional crew members to its northern region and plans to add 500 locomotives and 5,000 railcars this year to help ease the snarls, Ice said.

 

[Phil S]

Has anyone noticed any improvement for both #7 and #8 in the last few days?

Honestly, from my perspective, it's still a complete craps shoot.

Has anyone noticed any improvement for both #7 and #8 in the last few days?

Honestly, from my perspective, it's still a complete craps shoot.

Back to "normal". Today's #8 in MN is well over 5 hours behind and even #8 in MT is running just under 2 hours late before reaching any of the worrisome areas. And 7/27 are about 4 hours behind as well.

In the first quarter of FY14, the Empire Builder arrived on time in Chicago 1.1% of the time. Which means only once.

The craps shoot comment I buy. Anything can still happen and often does. As for "back to normal", that's not what I said. On-time once, yes, but that's not a very important stat. 30 minutes late would be just as good as on time. Any way to get average delay, say by week, w/o slogging through the data inn say jb's amstatus files?

All that said, it does look better today than it has in a while. So - is anything getting better or are we just throwing better craps? Did some work get finished? Has the weather helped (but just wait until the snow starts really melting!)? Has BNSF traffic dropped even a little?

IAC, I head out E on the 14th and am looking forward to the trip. Taking every precaution I can - food, drink, lots to read, booked hotel in CHI rather than try to make connection to #50. And, yes, it still beats flying, if you have the time and $.

 

[yarrow]

BNSF Sees Bakken-Area Rail Tie-Up Lasting Until Year-End

BNSF Railway Co., the carrier owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will need the rest of 2014 to untangle train tie-ups in the corridor that serves North Dakota’s Bakken shale region.

A system-wide traffic jam, caused by surging grain and crude-oil volumes coupled with harsh weather, is being resolved on the southern lines linkingChicago and Los Angeles, Chief Executive Officer Carl Ice said yesterday in an interview at the railroad’s headquarters in Fort Worth,Texas....

Ice’s forecast underscored the scope of the recovery effort for U.S. railroads after winter storms and rising cargo shipments disrupted operations. BNSF sent 300 additional crew members to its northern region and plans to add 500 locomotives and 5,000 railcars this year to help ease the snarls, Ice said.

i understand that bnsf is doing infrastructure improvement on the hi-line due to deteriorated and inadequate infrastructure. the problem became acute with the increase in traffic and it is that congestion which is primarily causing the delays. how then does adding 500 locos and 5000 cars help "ease the snarls"?

 

[montana mike]

My local BNSF guys got a real chuckle out of Mr. Ice's statements. They ALL said that internal BNSF communications are clear that it will be late 2015 when all of the infrastructure improvements needed are in place. And they said the winter impacts, while notable, were actually slightly less than in several recent winters. Yes, it was cold and the cold caused some serious delays, but the entire Hi-Line area had slightly below normal snowfall and overall the winter pattern was not one of the worst events in their memory banks.

As they have said over and over, it's mostly about traffic and sheer numbers of trains, which have increased consistently, without a corresponding increase in the trackage to cope with the increases.

BTW-#7 pulling into SEA about 3 hours late and #8 looks like it will be over 4 hours behind into CHI today (after being well over 6 hours late yesterday). Bummer.

 

[George Harris]

BNSF Sees Bakken-Area Rail Tie-Up Lasting Until Year-End

BNSF Railway Co., the carrier owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will need the rest of 2014 to untangle train tie-ups in the corridor that serves North Dakota’s Bakken shale region.

A system-wide traffic jam, caused by surging grain and crude-oil volumes coupled with harsh weather, is being resolved on the southern lines linkingChicago and Los Angeles, Chief Executive Officer Carl Ice said yesterday in an interview at the railroad’s headquarters in Fort Worth,Texas....

Ice’s forecast underscored the scope of the recovery effort for U.S. railroads after winter storms and rising cargo shipments disrupted operations. BNSF sent 300 additional crew members to its northern region and plans to add 500 locomotives and 5,000 railcars this year to help ease the snarls, Ice said.

i understand that bnsf is doing infrastructure improvement on the hi-line due to deteriorated and inadequate infrastructure. the problem became acute with the increase in traffic and it is that congestion which is primarily causing the delays. how then does adding 500 locos and 5000 cars help "ease the snarls"?

Notice also there was 300 additional crew members. If things are tied up due to congestion, then the crews go dead on the law and are not available for another train until they have completed their mandated rest. That is where additional crews help. If things are tied up due to congestion, then the engines are not available for another train until they have completed the run they are on and been serviced. That is where additional engines help. If things are tied up due to congestion, then cars don't complete their trip and get unloaded as fast, or if empty get taken to the point where they are needed to be loaded as fast, so they are not available for another train thus it takes more cars to move the same amount of traffic. That is where moe cars help. And then there is the point that there is more traffic out there that needs to be moved.

What was not said in the part quoted is that BNSF is adding more sidings and sections of second main along the hi-line. This will enable the line to handle more trains and have less delay. Adding track is expensive. It is. or has been in the past, an out of pocket expense, as you can't get a loan on something that can't be reposessed. Grading can't be repo'ed. Bridges, culverts, and other drainage work is also unretreivable expense beyond the scrap value of steel in bridges. This may not be worth doing given that there are steel bridges on abandoned lines sitting out there rusting into oblivion. Track materials can be, but it is near pointless, as the labor to install can't be repo'ed and the material value is reduced by the labor to remove it. There might be such a thing as buying rail on credit, but the rest of the new track is essentially sunk expense. Saying all this to say that generally adding track is something that is done after all that can be done otherwise has been. It takes eliminating a lot of delay cost to justify spending money on additional trackage.

 

[NW cannonball]

BNSF Sees Bakken-Area Rail Tie-Up Lasting Until Year-End

BNSF Railway Co., the carrier owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will need the rest of 2014 to untangle train tie-ups in the corridor that serves North Dakota’s Bakken shale region.

A system-wide traffic jam, caused by surging grain and crude-oil volumes coupled with harsh weather, is being resolved on the southern lines linkingChicago and Los Angeles, Chief Executive Officer Carl Ice said yesterday in an interview at the railroad’s headquarters in Fort Worth,Texas....

Ice’s forecast underscored the scope of the recovery effort for U.S. railroads after winter storms and rising cargo shipments disrupted operations. BNSF sent 300 additional crew members to its northern region and plans to add 500 locomotives and 5,000 railcars this year to help ease the snarls, Ice said.

Thanks for posting the BNSF "company line" as Ice related it to Bloomberg.

How can BNSF get another 500 locos before year end? They are already, by many reports, and my own observation joyriding the Northstar and just watching the rails near here, they are begging, borrowing, and leasing whatever they can get for power. Ancient NS livery last-generation-but-two road engines, for example.

And the backlog of trains parked all across the Hi-Line -- maybe BNSF can relocate crews short-term, and hire rookie engineers and conductors medium-term -- and in a year or two have trained crews on the district.

Maybe BNSF can get new locomotives, but not 500 before year-end.

Thinking that last years roadbed improvements will help a bit, when they get the new crews trained, and the leased - borrowed power will help.

Maybe intensive training for the dispatchers in Fort Worth, and better software, might help the congestion.

But "Improved by end of year" would be a total misreading. "Not improved before end of 2014" would be a better interpretation.

 

[yarrow]

BNSF Sees Bakken-Area Rail Tie-Up Lasting Until Year-End

BNSF Railway Co., the carrier owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will need the rest of 2014 to untangle train tie-ups in the corridor that serves North Dakota’s Bakken shale region.

A system-wide traffic jam, caused by surging grain and crude-oil volumes coupled with harsh weather, is being resolved on the southern lines linkingChicago and Los Angeles, Chief Executive Officer Carl Ice said yesterday in an interview at the railroad’s headquarters in Fort Worth,Texas....

Ice’s forecast underscored the scope of the recovery effort for U.S. railroads after winter storms and rising cargo shipments disrupted operations. BNSF sent 300 additional crew members to its northern region and plans to add 500 locomotives and 5,000 railcars this year to help ease the snarls, Ice said.

i understand that bnsf is doing infrastructure improvement on the hi-line due to deteriorated and inadequate infrastructure. the problem became acute with the increase in traffic and it is that congestion which is primarily causing the delays. how then does adding 500 locos and 5000 cars help "ease the snarls"?

Notice also there was 300 additional crew members. If things are tied up due to congestion, then the crews go dead on the law and are not available for another train until they have completed their mandated rest. That is where additional crews help. If things are tied up due to congestion, then the engines are not available for another train until they have completed the run they are on and been serviced. That is where additional engines help. If things are tied up due to congestion, then cars don't complete their trip and get unloaded as fast, or if empty get taken to the point where they are needed to be loaded as fast, so they are not available for another train thus it takes more cars to move the same amount of traffic. That is where moe cars help. And then there is the point that there is more traffic out there that needs to be moved.

What was not said in the part quoted is that BNSF is adding more sidings and sections of second main along the hi-line. This will enable the line to handle more trains and have less delay. Adding track is expensive. It is. or has been in the past, an out of pocket expense, as you can't get a loan on something that can't be reposessed. Grading can't be repo'ed. Bridges, culverts, and other drainage work is also unretreivable expense beyond the scrap value of steel in bridges. This may not be worth doing given that there are steel bridges on abandoned lines sitting out there rusting into oblivion. Track materials can be, but it is near pointless, as the labor to install can't be repo'ed and the material value is reduced by the labor to remove it. There might be such a thing as buying rail on credit, but the rest of the new track is essentially sunk expense. Saying all this to say that generally adding track is something that is done after all that can be done otherwise has been. It takes eliminating a lot of delay cost to justify spending money on additional trackage.

thanks, george

 

[XHRTSP]

Dumb question, but do or did any locos ever have crew rest compartments like certain long haul airliners, whereas an augmented crew could work well beyond the normal limits?

Hell, does Amtrak even do that?

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Nope.

It seem rest on the train is not permitted. Passenger and Frieght trains does not matter.

Only on a Truck can a co-driver get rest while moving down the road.

 

[mwmnp]

FYI, here is a chart of the weekly petroleum carload numbers on the BNSF network. Overall the count has been pretty flat the last four months.

 

[montana mike]

Two reasons: They lack additional cars (to be remedied beginning in May) and the lack of additional crew and engines to pull the cars (TBD as to when this issue will be resolved).

The rise will continue once these issues are resolved--and BNSF knows it!!

 

[CHamilton]

Commentary from the Seattle Transit Blog.

The Empire Builder runs rather well here in Washington..., and we shouldn’t let miseries in the upper Midwest deter us from seeking better service across our state. This new schedule will have the (accidental but pleasant) effect of giving Spokane decent eastbound service, with a 9:00pm arrival time. (Westbound will get worse, however, with a 3:45am departure.)

Meanwhile, on this side of the Cascades, we have 7 trainsets making only 13 daily runs, an overcapitalized and underused fleet that awaits the completion of the Point Defiance Bypass and other projects. I would love to see WSDOT fund a temporary pilot project to give daily roundtrip service to Spokane through 2017 using one of those surplus sets, just to give Eastern Washington a taste of intercity travel that is better than either uncomfortable buses or unreliable trains. If the train performed poorly, we could cut it. If it performed well, we could fund it.

 

[neroden]

Nope.

It seem rest on the train is not permitted. Passenger and Frieght trains does not matter.

Only on a Truck can a co-driver get rest while moving down the road.

One of the insane anti-rail rules promulgated by the FRA, the Federal Prevention of Railroads Administration as I occasionally call it.

 

[montana mike]

Ah, I remember the oft used quote: We are from the federal government and we are here to help you! Every once in a while common sense prevails, but perhaps not in this case!

Today's trains: Pretty much status quo, with both #7 in WA and #8 in MN well over 4 hours behind schedule. It would appear the three hour "jumpstart" will help the east bound trains arrive within 1-2 hours of the schedule in CHI, but the 90 minute adjustments going westbound may not be sufficient to achieve on time arrivals in SEA and PDX. Time will tell.

 

[Paulus]

Nope.

It seem rest on the train is not permitted. Passenger and Frieght trains does not matter.

Only on a Truck can a co-driver get rest while moving down the road.

One of the insane anti-rail rules promulgated by the FRA, the Federal Prevention of Railroads Administration as I occasionally call it.

That's not insane at all. Did you forget about the necessity of qualifying on all territory that you operate on?

 

[Ryan]

You're going to have to connect the dots there, because I don't see what one has to do with the other.

 

[Paulus]

You're going to have to connect the dots there, because I don't see what one has to do with the other.

Sleeping on trucks makes a certain degree of sense because you can just swap out and a drivers license permits driving anywhere in the US. Not so for trains, the crew will need to be qualified on all territory that they might be reasonably expected to operate if sleeping aboard the train and swapping out similar to a truck. The manpower requirements remain the same, but now there's a significantly increased training cost. That's on top of a definitely worsened crew rest with possible safety issues as well.

 

[Ryan]

In the context of the EB, where massive delays are common, having a second crew available on the train available to take over when the original operating crew dies on the law.

Since the relief crew would be in their home territory, they'd obviously be qualified.

 

[Bruce-C]

Not a single poster has mentioned that Amtrak (or any company for that matter) will be paying for that second crew for the entire journey. Where are they going to get the money for that!

 

[neroden]

Sleeping on trucks makes a certain degree of sense because you can just swap out and a drivers license permits driving anywhere in the US. Not so for trains, the crew will need to be qualified on all territory that they might be reasonably expected to operate if sleeping aboard the train and swapping out similar to a truck.

You don't see anything wrong with this picture? It's a massive regulatory bias in favor of trucking and against railroads.
Perhaps you can argue that sleeping on trucks should be illegal, that commercial drivers' licenses shouldn't carry over from state to state, and that commercial truck & bus drivers should have to "qualify on all territory that they might reasonably be expected to operate".

I could totally believe that, given incidents like the Megabus driver killing a bunch of his passengers by going through a bridge which his bus didn't fit under.

If you're not going to argue that, then it's obvious that this stuff about "qualifying on the territory" for trains should be abandoned. The engineers don't steer the train, the dispatcher does. When PTC is implemented, the engineers won't even be necessary in order to follow the speed limits. Frankly, the engineer needs to know very little about the territory if it's signalled properly. Engineers are pretty close to *obsolete*, actually, with fully automated trains pretty much a solved technology. Yes, yes, "handling the slack action" -- that can be programmed too, and probably will be in the next few years.

I'd much, much rather have an unqualified train engineer on a line with PTC than some random guy with a CDL driving around a state he doesn't know well. The unqualified train engineer would be *less dangerous* than the guy cruising around in the truck.

But forget that. When trains are not running on schedule, the cost of qualifying crews on a lot of territory has to be a lot less than the cost of having "extra boards" for every X-hundred mile territory in case the train is late and the crew runs out of hours.

If the trains all ran on time and all the engineers and conductors lived next door to the train station, it would be different -- and frankly, that's the way it was in the 19th century when these obsolete rules were established.

Frankly, even the hours of service rules are whacky. Obviously there should be a limit on the number of hours of continuous service -- but 12 hours is way too long, and obviously an artifact of the railroads fighting to *not* have relief crews. On a very long run, three crews taking turns every 8 hours would be the sort of operation which the military or an ordinary business would understand. With the current system, the Empire Builder uses more crews than that on any given train.... and if I'm not mistaken, has to pay them something for "waiting around" time as well.

 

[George Harris]

Neroden: I agree that there is a certain amount of regulatory bias in favor of trucking, but for the most:

There is no equivalence for several of the other points.

As a basis for many of the differences: Driving on the road, regardless of what you are driving is a line of sight activity. In many of its aspects operating a train is not. That is the basis for the need for signals, for starts.

The magabus strike against a low overpass is an example of failure of the driver to properly react to something he should have seen. If he did not see it, there was one of two things at play: Either the bus was higher than he thought it was, which would have been a serious error on his part. Or, the low overpass was not marked as standards require, which would be an error on the part of the state or whoever maintained the road. Another thing: There are commercial drivers road atlases that mark things of significance to drivers of large vehicles that are not of significance to automobile drivers, with low overhead clearances being one of them.

Qualifying for the territory is a necessity because of the line of sight issues for starts. Another point is the nature of the grades, particularly with long freight trains. If you have a long freight train it could be spread over two or three grades. Improper train handling will result in slack action that can give you broken knuckles or harsh slack action that could damage freight. These are just a couple of examples. Some of the engineers that visit here could probably come up with a page or two of reasons for the need for qualification by territory. Remember also, most of the railroad lines were initially built over 100 years ago. They do not begin to have the nice consistency that roads have.

People have been chasing the concept of "unmanned operation" for quite a few years in the transit world. So far the reality says don't do it. Several years back now there is an outstanding example of a WMATA operator that was directed to keep his train in automatic operation after requesting to be allowed to go manual more than once. He would have lost his job if he had done so anyway. He bet his life on the screw-ups being done by the automatic system not being too serious and lost. I want a functional coherent human being in the front of any train I am riding.

The unqualified on the territory train engineer might be "less dangerous" than the truck driver on a road he does not know, but that is not saying a lot when you consider the relative accident ratios. By the way, most truck and bus drivers do run the same territory over and over normally, so they do become quite familiar with their normal territories.

Maintaining an "extra board" has no cost. Train crews do not get paid if they are not called.

The 12 hour limit is the law. It is not a standard or normal practice, it is THE LAW. It is the norm for a normal run to be well under 8 hours. You cannot rationally set the allowable maximum and the standard in the same place. If you do everything to the legal maximum, then anything out of whack lead to either legal violations or trains sitting out n the line dead on the law. By the way, in past years the legal limit was 16 hours. It was well the norm during WW2 that crews would be out on the road for their 16 hours and then being called out again "on their rest."

 

[mjaynes288]

Maintaining an "extra board" has no cost. Train crews do not get paid if they are not called.

I thought people on the extra board had a minimum garuntee. They are garunteed pay for a certain number of hours even if they are never called.

 

[greatcats]

I would agree with mjaynes about guarantees. As a former crew dispatcher, I recall there was a guarantee. It wasn't always that way and it may differ from one company to another, according to the agreement, but it went something like this: A crew member was guaranteed 40 hours pay if they were available for work for an entire seven day period. If they were only called for three or four days work and they had not absented themselves by marking off or missing a call, then the crew member would be entitled to forty hours pay. If the work was too slow and the extra board became too large, then the company could cut the size of the extra board. Much of the time the extra board was a place to make good money if the work was busy and the opportunity to make well over 40 hours was common. Probably those BNSF crews are cleaning up on this situation.