Media Circus Time

While this Journal article was prompted by East Palestine, it appears to have applicability to the entire industry. Therefore I am submitting to the General Discussion Forum:

Fair Use:

In the world of railroading, keeping the trains moving is paramount, and Norfolk Southern Corp. has little tolerance for late departures.

Supervisors can be penalized for trains that are ready to leave but instead sit in rail yards, according to current and former employees of the Atlanta-based railroad. Train inspection time frames are tight. Employees who seek more-stringent reviews of rail equipment or slow down transport can face discipline.

Scott Wilcox, a sixth-generation railroader who is retired from Norfolk Southern, said its railcar inspectors used to have five to eight minutes to check a car’s wheels and brakes for problems like leaky bearings or damaged components. Now they often have between 30 seconds and a minute, he said.

“So basically all they’re doing is connecting air hoses between the cars for the brake system and that’s it,” Mr. Wilcox said. “They don’t have time to do anything else. At least not without getting in trouble.”

It just seems as if East Palestine, from which there have been no reported injuries and in which "the jury is still out" regarding environmental damage is becoming one gigantic "Greatest Show on Earth"

Mr. Wilcox is describing a known problem of "speeding up" processes in the name of efficiency. Every instance comes at the expense of quality and/or safety. Everyone who's been told "to do more with less" has experienced the same phenomenon. If this is to be a media circus, the opening act is a compelling one.

[edited to clarify: "this" in last sentence refers to the media "eye of Sauron" gazing on the railroad industry...for the time being.]

From "America's Finest News Source": Demand Grows For Stricter Transit Regulations

Keep the trains on the rails and there is no media circus. Especially the hazardous material consists. Determining derailments to be just the cost of doing business cuts both ways.

The circus just will not end:

New York Times

Fair Use:

Norfolk Southern once had so few accidents and injuries that it won the rail industry’s prestigious E.H. Harriman safety award for 23 years in a row until it was retired in 2012. But in the last decade, the company has gone from an industry leader to a laggard.

The rate at which its trains are involved in accidents and its workers are injured on the job has soared, putting it at or near the bottom on those safety measures among the country’s four largest freight railroads. Employees, former workers and some rail experts blame decisions by executives to cut thousands of jobs and put pressure on employees to speed up deliveries in a drive to bolster profits.

In the more than sixty years, including eleven "on the inside" that I have followed railroad industry affairs, I have never seen the industry - Megantic notwithstanding- confronted with so much adverse media attention.

Warranted? "we report, you decide".

The NYT ought to follow up with a story about the demise of the Harriman award. (I'm sure it wasn't because NS got tired of all the winning...). Some smart PR flack at AAR is recommending its revival pronto, I should think.

Who decided that Lac-Mégantic is the threshold for whether media coverage is a circus or warranted?

And I don't believe the initial incident was the driver of all the adverse attention. The NS and federal/state response to said incident was the cause. In my opinion, anyway.

CRB wrote: ↑Mon Apr 03, 2023 12:58 pm Who decided that Lac-Mégantic is the threshold for whether media coverage is a circus or warranted?

And I don't believe the initial incident was the driver of all the adverse attention. The NS and federal/state response to said incident was the cause. In my opinion, anyway.

Explosions, death, injury, and property damage tend to get people's attention.

That is part of the media circus. The old saying is still true: "If it bleeds, it leads."

And the deep diving begins:

https://www.propublica.org/article/trai ... ong-trains

Trains are getting longer. Railroads are getting richer. But these “monster trains” are jumping off of tracks across America and regulators are doing little to curb the risk.

Mr. Wolf, don't think that "exactly" includes my UNP:

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/UN ... &window=5Y

Considering its lackluster performance of recent, it just may get the "dump" from me.

Oh, but it does pay a nice dividend.

Gilbert B Norman wrote: ↑Thu Apr 06, 2023 1:19 pm Mr. Wolf, don't think that "exactly" includes my UNP:

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/UN ... &window=5Y

Considering its lackluster performance of recent, it just may get the "dump" from me.

Oh, but it does pay a nice dividend.

UP has it's own issues. Remember that it's got court orders to improve service, which news got out to the shareholders and forced the CEO to resign. Not only would I be watching UP's actions like a hawk, but I'd also look at safer non-railroad stock as well.

Heh, reminds me of a comic by a fellow artist. One epilogue was on how to make money by exposing scandal and forcing reform. Takes money, though...

Yeah, no. Fritz stepped down because of pressure from hedge funds and activist investors.

It had nothing to do with service levels or court orders.

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eolesen wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 8:13 pm Yeah, no. Fritz stepped down because of pressure from hedge funds and activist investors.

It had nothing to do with service levels or court orders.

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Who said the hedge funds and activist investors didn't get wind of the court orders? It may of been a factor in them pushing for the CEO's head. We won't know.

You're really reaching, Wolf... We know exactly why the hedge fund drove his outster -- they've been been unhappy for the last 8 years. It's about financially underperforming compared to the other Class 1's. It has nothing to do with service levels or court orders.

Read for yourself:

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/ ... ectors.pdf

There was nothing false about Mr. Norman's original post. A few months ago I got off the road and worked a local job. One of the job's tasks is to make up a road freight. On a particular day we had issues with the power. One unit had a bad headend device, which still didn't work in spite of swapping it out. The other had PTC problems. They called in the road foreman who was going to show me how to fix things. He did all the tricks which I'd already tried and failed at. In the end they ended up putting the little GP in the lead, which was supposed to be swapped out at the train's destination. The point is that by the time we had the whole debacle sorted, the officials were getting nervous because of the dreaded departure deadline.

Years ago more of the yards had carmen in them. My home terminal did too. Over the years their ranks were thinned. No the few remaining are at a smaller yard with a smaller volume of traffic. Now trainmen do the outbound inspections and brake tests. This is not only savings on the expense of the carmen wages. A trainman is not trained to spot as many defective conditions. Carmen can do a more thorough inspection. The company doesn't want to delay a train by having to kick out cripples. Usually a visit by the state inspector or the FRA nets lots of cars which are't fit to go on the road.