CSX stresses teamwork in moving passengers and freight

[themallard]

The phone rang early at Dale Zehner's house on Jan. 5.

Zehner, chief executive officer of the Virginia Railway Express, was dismayed to hear that that one of his trains derailed near Quantico, injuring several passengers and a conductor and creating a mess for Northern Virginia commuters.

But something good came out of the 7 a.m. phone call from Jay S. Westbrook, the new public face of CSX in Virginia. CSX owns the track and needed to fix the problem to help its tenant railroads -- such as VRE and Amtrak -- but also to get its trains back on the move.

Within 10 minutes of the Quantico derailment, Westbrook asked, "'What do you need from us?'"

Then Westbrook and a trouble-shooting team caught a corporate jet from CSX's headquarters in Jacksonville, Fla., and arrived on the scene only hours after the accident. He pledged to get the trains rolling by the next day, and he managed to make good on his promise.

"My feeling is that wouldn't have happened" without Westbrook's swift intervention, Zehner said.

The quick response marked a turnabout for CSX, not known for speedy service or communications.

"We have lots of challenges, but at least now we have a single point of contact," said Karen Rae, director of the state Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

Westbrook's new job marks a "much higher level of commitment" by CSX to mend fences here, said Rae, a sometimes harsh critic of the nation's third largest railroad...

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