Western Railroad Discussion > BNSF on way to epic meltdown?

Heard from someone working for BNSF that the BNSF has numerous trains tied down on the HiLine ("northern transcon"), maybe approaching 100. Talk of parking trains and taking their power off for use elsewhere. Shades of how UP's famous meltdown started in the mid 90's... Winter hasn't even started yet!

"Heard from someone who works for BNSF", now there's a reliable source!
I think if they had parked 100 trains on the Northern Transcon there would have been several posts about it here on Train Orders already!

Does BNSF even operate anything near 100 trains on the Hi-Line? Seems a bit extreme to have that many trains parked.
-Dalton

BNSF melting down is like Chuck Norris crying. The management, dispatchers, crew callers and MCOs are on point!

I don't know about 100 trains but I can confirm its a mess. At my terminal we are constantly out of crews. The ones that are working are working on there rest. Trains struggle to make it terminal to terminal in under 12 hours. I was told that the NW division only will be receiving 4 mercenaries and they will go to Seattle. Just a few days ago I counted 23 open holes in the Spokane/Hauser terminal with just 6 men on the bump board, and that was after they cut several extra boards. It's going to be a long winter, grumpy tiered crews, pissy dispatchers and Trainmasters making messed up moves all day long. As a old head told me, Open your wallets boys and let the company fill them up. I wonder if they will miss the guys they furloughed and quit early this year just to cut the boards for two weeks.
Kevin

That must be why over the course of these next 5 years they are hiring over 15, 000 employees, and spending billions of dollars in infastructure system wide. Not sure who this source is but the above is direct from the horses mouth.

I think this problem is very real and while the exact number of 100 trains is probably a little much but who knows. This may be effecting the MRL as well as a friend of mine was along the 3rd sub driving I-90 and noted that every siding including the couple uncontrolled ones had westbounds tied down and or cut for crossings. So yes the problem is very real

I know nothing about the status of these trains, or any of them being 'tied down', but I can confirm there are quite a few freights at the moment (43 WB, 44 EB) between Seattle WA, and the Montana / North Dakota state line.

Mr. MRL



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/10/13 18:34 by MrMRL.

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This situation has been building for years up here in the NW. Surprised it took this long to get here. Let's see how it gets handled. UP's meltdown took years to undo. I remember seeing every siding in a 150 mile stretch with a train in it. Complete gridlock

The odis screen looks normal to me. That seems about right for the amount of trains. Vast majority of the westbounds are Grain. They often tie grain down typically not a major move (hot). It depends on the ships and ports on weather they are ready for them. Also very few H manifests. Many were M symbols meaning low priority. There were a few z trains, but not a whole bunch. There were your typical V moves again not hot hot hot due to weather the ports have a ship in or are ready for them.
Look you will know if it is totally a mess when you see every z train on the ex santa fe tied down and it is not due to a derailment, outage, or weather.
All 7 class 1 railroads lay way too many off thinking they will be able to kiss the fanny of every stockholder to the point of joy, problem is there is a reason those people are on those boards. It takes real management to know to leave them alone. Yes there will be times they pay them to sit at home longer then normal, but when the poo hits the fan they will be glad when they are available. No one ever tells the stockholders that they just laid off x people after paying for them only to have to pay a whole other group once they laid off too many. Also the large group of retires to happen are not quite there yet. It will be soon though. Between now and 2016 I expect the railroads will have to replace those retired and more just to keep the stuff fluid. There are places all over the BNSF that make no sense. For example no double track between Galesburg and Bushnell, IL. The Beardstown sub being Dark territory as well as some of the Ottumwa/Creston and Savanna, IL north. Not have putting in double track sooner in KS so as to avoid using the topeka side. Not using the old bn more in MO as a way around the Sibley single track bridge. Leaving the river sub along the Miss with not enough sidings, the barstow sub in IL just now getting a longer siding at Barstow, IL, not making small yards outside of Chicago to hold trains leaving the mainlines blocked same around Galesburg, IL Lincoln, NE and so on.

Meanwhile the southern Transcon seems a little empty. Things seem to have slowed WAY down on this end of the railroad after the early October peak. It's not as slow as it was a few years ago, but there are lots of baretables in storage, particularly the marine stack train baretables. I could be wrong, but I don't remember that business dropping-off so much at this time of year. Usually that's late December and well into January.

-Tom

I drove from Billings to Missoula today, the only trains I saw parked were east of Missoula. Three grain loads...the second and third subs were wide open.


NWRailfan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think this problem is very real and while the
> exact number of 100 trains is probably a little
> much but who knows. This may be effecting the MRL
> as well as a friend of mine was along the 3rd sub
> driving I-90 and noted that every siding including
> the couple uncontrolled ones had westbounds tied
> down and or cut for crossings. So yes the problem
> is very real

This person also said that the line up for Spokane shows almost 90 trains on it over the next 24 hours. My guess is that this is probably like most railroad's lineups where the computer generates an estimation which rarely is totally accurate, but for there to be anywhere near that many trains is quite impressive, especially for a Sunday! Was also told that 22 of the trains were loaded grain trains.

cpn456 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This person also said that the line up for Spokane
> shows almost 90 trains on it over the next 24
> hours. My guess is that this is probably like
> most railroad's lineups where the computer
> generates an estimation which rarely is totally
> accurate, but for there to be anywhere near that
> many trains is quite impressive, especially for a
> Sunday! Was also told that 22 of the trains were
> loaded grain trains.

Here's what was called in the last 48 hours Hauser

Hauser-Pasco 50
Pasco-Hauser 42

Hauser-Wenatchee 18
Wenatchee-Hauser 20

Hauser-Whitefish 41
Whitefish-Hauser 41

Kevin

What is happen to Amtrak 7&8 timekeeping on the Line another bad Winter for Amtrak?? Very late trains.

It's funny trying to follow things sometimes. From reading this thread, there is absolutely nothing conclusive. Some say meltdown, some say normal, some say busy but not meltdown, etc, etc, etc....I have no clue what the situation is, but it's just funny to watch the politicking that's always going on behind the scenes. It's subtle....very subtle....but it's there quite often.

GCOR 1.6 was used against me when I insulted my Terminal Trainmaster's ability to move 71 trains through the terminal I work on the Hi-Line. They moved 32 that day, and 22 trains were tied down. Only six trains made it from Minot to Glasgow within the crew's 12 hours. Five days in a row a pilot crew was sent west with Amtrak's St. Cloud crew to go dogcatch the Eastbound Builder, because they couldn't make it to Minot in hours of service.

BNSF is averaging 4 crews to get EVERY SINGLE grain train from Minot to Glasgow. The long pools are twindled down to nothing. Local chairman ran miles and it shows to add FOURTEEN turns to the Minot-Glasgow pool. We do not have 14 men to spare, keep them tight and burn the extraboards. Mercenary positions are open for trainmen and engineers. A class of six engineers marked up out of piglet school TODAY and still cannot fill jobs. The Hi-Line is in utter melt down mode from Havre to Northtown.

My suggestion though, would to be not make assumptions or comments about our embarrassing daily meltdowns without knowing the true hard facts. 90 trains is a little far-fetched, 60 is more like the normal for the part of the Hi-Line I work, which happens to be the busiest with all of the oil traffic.

I tied a train down at Epping last night, and five more tied down behind us. When I tied up three hours after tying it down, eleven EB's were tied down between Williston and Minot.

I can only say so much on the public forum, so if you have more questions, PM me.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/10/13 21:53 by eightandsand.

I'd like to borrow out up there.

Posted from Android

I know the grain export elevators were also getting backed up, causing grain trains to be held. BNSF asked us to hold onto a grain train that should have left early this last week until Friday. But it wasn't until today we finally got the power for it. The hand off went smooth for the most part. With a front row seat to BNSF's Lakeside sub, I can attest that things are as busy as suggested. It's been a constant parade of trains all weekend.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

coaststarlight99 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's funny trying to follow things sometimes. From
> reading this thread, there is absolutely nothing
> conclusive. Some say meltdown, some say normal,
> some say busy but not meltdown, etc, etc, etc....I
> have no clue what the situation is, but it's just
> funny to watch the politicking that's always going
> on behind the scenes. It's subtle....very
> subtle....but it's there quite often.


That's because mostly everybody who has made a post with their comment/opinion...is a railroading genius...

Owen Hardy
Barrel Arbor, TN