Agreed here as well. The railroad is not the holdup.
gokeefe
Railroad Forums
Naugatuck Intermodal Yard - Pan Am Southern PAS / Poland Spring
- Guilford Rail System changed its name to Pan Am Railways in 2006. Discussion relating to the current operations of the Boston & Maine, the Maine Central, and the Springfield Terminal railroads (as well as the Delaware & Hudson while it was under Guilford control until 1988). Official site can be found here: PANAMRAILWAYS.COM.
Moderator: MEC407
Well that's good to hear.
Peter B&MMEC
bostontrainguy wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 11:06 am Isn't there lots of room in Cedar Hill for this?Yes, but I assume there's plenty of paper barriers from Conrail/CSX as to what Pan Am can and can't do there, and I'd say setting up shop with intermodal is probably something that CSX wouldn't be okay with.
There are indeed restrictions in New Haven/Cedar Hill from the Conrail split, that prevent Pan Am from doing any intermodal there.
And that includes restrictions on what can also be interchanged up at West Springfield and Hartford with the Connecticut Southern.
So the existing Pan Am line from Berlin to Waterbury, including rights on Metro North are the only available locations.
Plus with this being such a short haul, having another railroad involved in the move would ruin the economic advantages of rail.
And that includes restrictions on what can also be interchanged up at West Springfield and Hartford with the Connecticut Southern.
So the existing Pan Am line from Berlin to Waterbury, including rights on Metro North are the only available locations.
Plus with this being such a short haul, having another railroad involved in the move would ruin the economic advantages of rail.
B&M Does have intermodal rights into Ceder Hill, though I don't know what limitations are involved. B&M briefly ran intermodal in there from Maine and Saint Albans. But Naugatuck is half hour closer to the major customer and there is land there to develop (perhaps that is the holdup at Cedar Hill, since Pan-Am doesn't own anything there).
The amount of BS "paper barriers" controlling interchanges that CSX created killed that IM run and hamstrings CSOR as well.
Cedar Hill is shared with Amtrak,P&W,CSX,and CSOR.
Cedar Hill is shared with Amtrak,P&W,CSX,and CSOR.
The Land of Enchantment is not Flyover country!
Those paper barriers are far from "BS" and certainly misunderstood. What they reflect are like property rights much like you would see in franchising. Each of these rights, whether trackage or interchange, reflect a sale or, in CSOR's situation, what in essence is subcontracting created by Conrail in was was called a "Conrail Express Agreement". So, when you think of CSOR, besides the branches they own outright, just think CSX because they are handlng that traffic for CSX and in CSX's interest, not as an independent carrier. Calling paper barriers "BS" is like saying the same thing of Dunkin Donuts because their franchises are not allowed to sell Starbucks coffee! I think conductorchris's post was spot on.
CSX will never get that traffic anyway. Seems like it could be an opportunity for some kind of long term lease arrangement. CSX would benefit monetarily and everyone else would get their operation going. It's not like that yard is being used. Better than having it just waste away, no?
As conductorchris posted above, PAS has rights, but land, location to best serve Poland Spring if it were to materialize, a site-specific public push for this potential project, and, last, but not least, Pan Am's obvious preference to focus its business on the CT branches (and avoid additional Amtrak mileage) would be the likely drivers of this.
bostontrainguy wrote: ↑Sun May 03, 2020 9:01 am CSX will never get that traffic anyway. Seems like it could be an opportunity for some kind of long term lease arrangement. CSX would benefit monetarily and everyone else would get their operation going. It's not like that yard is being used. Better than having it just waste away, no?That's not how railroads win customers. They force capitulation by the customer and the other line by never making concessions on their carefully negotiated paper barriers. If the customer's needs are serious enough they and their carrier of origin will figure it out.
In this case the shipper and the originating carrier have a one line solution available to them that makes Cedar Hill irrelevant.
gokeefe
Lol. No kidding. Fair enough. 
gokeefe