Canadian Railroads > CP Reduces from 3 operating regions to 2

Keith Creel excerpt from yesterday's Q1 2016 earnings call transcript: "...We got some organizational changes that we approved yesterday with the board of directors that what we will be announcing today. I will go ahead and brief our shareholders on effectively what we are going to do right now. We operate with three regions. We have a western region and eastern region and a southern region, each run by a senior vice president of operations.Effective immediately we are going to consolidate those three regions to two. There will be a West region and an East region. Of course the US operation will fall under the guidance and the direction and leadership of the eastern region. We got Guido De Ciccio, who is currently the Senior Vice-President of the Western Region, and will remain the Senior Vice President of the Western Region. Tony Marquis, who is the Senior Vice-President of the East will pick up the US operation. Each of those from a development standpoint and from a coverage standpoint will get a vice president. So we are going to take two of our talented general managers from [Indiscernible] Steve Nettleton will be in the east, located in St. Paul, and in the west, Mr. Mark Redd will be vice president located in Winnipeg...Robert Johnson in turn will become the executive vice president of operations. Robert is going to move from St. Paul to Calgary, again effective immediately. So with all those changes we feel very, very solid team – very solid team. We will continue to drive and improve our record performance..."

And Creel excerpt on further track infrastructure down-sizing: "...Every switch that's in the main lines a potential [indiscernible], which obviously is not in any of our best interest. So, we're effectively going to eliminate what we went through last week in excess of 300 main line switches and about the same number as far as back tracks and yards. And taking out about 70 miles of track which can be cascaded and obviously minimize and reduce our future capital call...."

Oh, and it was announced that Hunter is expected to retire in 2017. 

 



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/21/16 03:09 by JPB.

Taking out 300 mainline switches says to me that a lot of loose car industries are going to lose their sidings.  So when you run off business he would be right that you won't need as much yards anymore.  Yes sir, either give me 100 cars at one time or nothing.  Well here comes nothing.

good bye cpr

tomstp Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Taking out 300 mainline switches says to me that a
> lot of loose car industries are going to lose
> their sidings.  So when you run off business he
> would be right that you won't need as much yards
> anymore.  Yes sir, either give me 100 cars at one
> time or nothing.  Well here comes nothing.

How many of those mainline switches serve ACTIVE customers though? There are mainline switches across the country that serve inactive customers. It makes sense to remove those, especially those who have no interest in rail service. 

Yes, I am sure someare  not active at all.   Others may only get a car every couple of months or so, some might be team tracks( or were those already torn out? )  But, I will bet some are occasionally used, just not as much and they want.  If you elimate those little used sidings then you can also eliminate the locals that switch them.  More and more of that is going on in the states and I would imagine in Canada too.

Calm down boys...I recently rode CPR round trip from near Calgary to Montreal and back on a business car escorting a train of very high value shipments.  There are still lots of auxillary tracks that are only used for maintainence of way, and even several yards that are not used but still connected to the main line.  I am sure that they are thinking of the high costs of maintaining a mainline high speed switch that is seldom used.

Norm

Norman Orfall
Helendale, CA
TIOGA PASS, a private railcar