Western Railroad Discussion > ??? About Long Pool Crews

i'm curious as to the use of long pool crews ... did/do long pool crews get assigned to low priority freights or just fast over the road high priority trains ??? ... to me it would only make sense for high priority max TT speed trains but then there's the long haul unit trains that don't make any intermediate stops enroute except for crew changes ... i don't know how railroads use the long pool crews so the question hopefully to get the answer ...

While I have never personally worked a territory with long/short pool combinations over the same territory it is my understanding the "long pool" crews tend to get expedited trains, such as intermodal, and "short pool" crews tend to get manifest trains which often do work.

Out here in Nevada we work them all as they arrive and get called out.

upengr21 Wrote:
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> Out here in Nevada we work them all as they arrive
> and get called out.

ok ... can you tell me if there's any specific type of tran assigned to the long pools ... ie fast intermodals ???

what's even more interesting is what can happen when a subdivision is "littered" with long pools and the possible h.o.s. issues near the end of their runs:  the short pools get "dumped" so the long pools don't go on the law and that could possibly treat the short pools to almost 12 hr runs........

66 

goneon66 Wrote:
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> what's even more interesting is what can
> happen when a subdivision is "littered" with
> long pools and the possible h.o.s. issues near the
> end of their runs:  the short pools get "dumped"
> so the long pools don't go on the law and that
> could possibly treat the short pools
> to almost 12 hr runs........
>
> 66 

This happens to us daily on the L.A. Basin pools (West Colton to L.A., Long Beach and everything in between). The have to show Omaha that the long pools are making it, so the short pools end up patching (or dog catching as we used to call it) them and we end up with 12 hours+. We just had a crew yesterday get 5 hours tow in waiting for a ride to the hotel after yarding their assigned train and then having to patch a long pool.
About 2 weeks a go I was the 4th crew on a long pool train, coming from Yuma, that got patched in West Colton.-BMT

UPNW2-1083 Wrote:
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> This happens to us daily on the L.A. Basin pools
> (West Colton to L.A., Long Beach and everything in
> between). The have to show Omaha that the long
> pools are making it, so the short pools end up
> patching (or dog catching as we used to call it)
> them and we end up with 12 hours+. We just had a
> crew yesterday get 5 hours tow in waiting for a
> ride to the hotel after yarding their assigned
> train and then having to patch a long pool.
> About 2 weeks a go I was the 4th crew on a long
> pool train, coming from Yuma, that got patched in
> West Colton.-BMT

They are trying really hard not to call patch crews. Keep using up other crews off of whatever that still happen to have a few hours left on the hours of service. I was crew three on a West Colton-Roseville manifest a couple months ago that ended up taking four crews to go from Bakersfield to Roseville, which is normally one crew district with no en-route work. Ended up I moved the train all of 15 miles before I died on the hours of service. Again it was all because they didn't want to call a fresh patch crew with a full 12 hours to work. Not sure how clogging up the mainlines for hours on end does much for their velocity, but that seems to be a distant second to the budgets currently.

The trains that get long pooled are high priority trains. In Southern California, the BNSF runs long pool from Needles to Los Angeles, Needles to Bakersfield, and Needles to San Bernardino. I believe all Z trains run long pool as well as some Q trains. The rest of the trains will crew change at Barstow; minus trains that have a final destination of San Bernardino.

From what I've heard (the Needles guys can correct me if I'm wrong) long pool is considered when the crew route is a certain amount of miles. For example the Seligman Subdivision is considered a long pool crew route since it's 291 miles from Winslow to Needles and 295 miles from Needles to Winslow. There isn't a crew change base between those two stations so everything is "long pool".

Posted from Android

UPNW2-1083 Wrote:
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> goneon66 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > what's even more interesting is what can
> > happen when a subdivision is "littered"
> with
> > long pools and the possible h.o.s. issues near
> the
> > end of their runs:  the short pools get
> "dumped"
> > so the long pools don't go on the
> law and that
> > could possibly treat the short pools
> > to almost 12 hr runs........
> >
> > 66 
>
> This happens to us daily on the L.A. Basin pools
> (West Colton to L.A., Long Beach and everything in
> between). The have to show Omaha that the long
> pools are making it, so the short pools end up
> patching (or dog catching as we used to call it)
> them and we end up with 12 hours+. We just had a
> crew yesterday get 5 hours tow in waiting for a
> ride to the hotel after yarding their assigned
> train and then having to patch a long pool.
> About 2 weeks a go I was the 4th crew on a long
> pool train, coming from Yuma, that got patched in
> West Colton.-BMT

I heard last night the MSCWC being yarded with a long pool crew as I sat on 3 hours of tow in waiting for a C job. They are doing everything possible to not call a patch and we've noticed if they do have a patch they try everything they can to call it under something that can hide it like a lite power symbol or a unit train.

Posted from Android



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/16 15:23 by jkchubbes.

The "Long Pool" designation comes from running through a terminal.   For the Seligman Sub, when they ran through Seligman 30+ years ago, that's what created a "long pool" even though there was no longer any "short pool".  Mileage in and of itself has nothing to do with it.
As for the long pools out of Needles westbound, running through Barstow is what makes it a long pool.   Not every Z train is a long pool west in/out of Needles, but a vast majority of them are.
slug96 Wrote:

>
> From what I've heard (the Needles guys can correct
> me if I'm wrong) long pool is considered when the
> crew route is a certain amount of miles. For
> example the Seligman Subdivision is considered a
> long pool crew route since it's 291 miles from
> Winslow to Needles and 295 miles from Needles to
> Winslow. There isn't a crew change base between
> those two stations so everything is "long pool".
>
> Posted from Android

zchcsse Wrote:
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> The "Long Pool" designation comes from running
> through a terminal.   For the Seligman Sub, when
> they ran through Seligman 30+ years ago, that's
> what created a "long pool" even though there was
> no longer any "short pool".  Mileage in and of
> itself has nothing to do with it.
> As for the long pools out of Needles westbound,
> running through Barstow is what makes it a long
> pool.   Not every Z train is a long pool west
> in/out of Needles, but a vast majority of them
> are.

that's the way i understood long pools to be ... when a crews runs on a combined 2 crew districts making a normally end point an intermdiate no crew change point ...

It started with local agreements that the companies wanted for the expedited trains.

Where I am it's high mileage which also comes with approx 3 days off between trips - so it's a senior board. It's all stack trains and autoracks.

Due to the territory all other trains are "short pool" due to tonnage and the hills (hence slower speeds). One terminal gets about 35-40 off between trips on average (little shorter turnarounds these days) and the other works almost everyday (130 mile district).

All are managed by the unions as they started by miliage prior to trip rates implemented. Start running over the agreed miliage and you add turns.

Posted from iPhone

Do engineer's and conductors both have to bid "long pool", and is that strictly the trains they run? Someone else said they had 3 days off between runs. Do they sit at the away terminal for 3 days or take the next "long pool " back to their home terminal after their rest, then have 3 days off at the home terminal?

You generally won't see any crew at an away terminal any longer than necessary as the road tries
it's best to avoid paying "heldaway". The 3 days off thing most likely is to avoid hitting the mileage
limit and as mentioned from what I've seen the long pools are definitely high senority. Oddly enough
so are some of the locals, it's dollars vs being home every night.

Out

callum_out Wrote:
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> You generally won't see any crew at an away
> terminal any longer than necessary as the road
> tries
> it's best to avoid paying "heldaway". The 3 days
> off thing most likely is to avoid hitting the
> mileage
> limit and as mentioned from what I've seen the
> long pools are definitely high seniority. Oddly
> enough
> so are some of the locals, it's dollars vs being
> home every night.
>
> Out

In the L.A. Basin, the "short" pool is the high seniority pool. The L.A. basin pool runs from West Colton to Long Beach/ L.A. Harbor areas. It's about a 60 mile run. The "long" pools run from Long Beach to Yermo and Yuma. The Yuma pool only makes about $70 more per run for going an extra 200 miles. In the late 90s, the UP went to arbitration to get the pools moved from L.A. to West Colton, but now they want to move all the pools back to L.A. which they pretty much have done with the long pools. 
We actually have 2 L.A. Basin pools from West Colton to the harbors. We have the "pod" turns which have calling windows and they are guaranteed a round trip weather they use you or not, so you go to the hotel every trip. Then there is the "09" pool which does the same work and same trains but is not guaranteed a round trip. The pod turns are high seniority (of which I hold one) with most of them higher seniority than many of the locals. there are 2 seperate boards in West Colton for these two pools but at the hotel the 2 pools are combined on one board.-BMT

Interesting, almost like an enhanced local ie guaranteed call times and a regular schedule. SP had many
of those in later years and if they had a brakeman it wasn't unusual to see 75 years total senority. 

Out

In my area, Norfolk Southern has now established a "super pool" that skips TWO intermediate terminals. Its assignments are all super-hot UPS trains -- 3 or 4 each way -- between Elkhart, Indiana and Conway, Pennsylvania. The skipped crew changes are Toledo and Cleveland.

callum_out Wrote:
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> Interesting, almost like an enhanced local ie
> guaranteed call times and a regular schedule. SP
> had many
> of those in later years and if they had a brakeman
> it wasn't unusual to see 75 years total
> senority. 
>
> Out

 hell 75 years is light for a crew with whiskers ... that's only 35 years a piece between 2 members of the crew ...

thx for all the replies fellas and anymore that are posted ...

Out_Of_Service Wrote:
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>  hell 75 years is light for a crew with whiskers
> ... that's only 35 years a piece between 2 members of the crew ...

​When I retired the crew I was on (3 people) had 127 combined years of seniority.
 

When AT&SF eliminated the crew change at Emporia in the fall on '88, it created a long, or longer pool for us. We still worked the same old trains, but they took longer to get over the road. There weren't any assigned trains in "unassigned pool service". You just got called for the next thing they ran, good or bad. You might get a 4 hour Z to Wellington, the guy called ten minutes behind you (or ahead ofyou) might get a 12 hr grain train, that might not even make it. They started swapping trains if crews got short of time west of Emporia, if they had a better train coming, sometimes they just had you tie it down someplace, and taxi you in, or you'd ride the train in with a relief crew they brought out. When the run-thru was first presented to us, they told us our layovers at home would be so long "you'll think we forgot to call you". (I still remember those words coming out of Homer Henry's mouth). Several days of ass time at home, what a deal. In reality, we worked as much, or more than when we worked out of Emporia. They indexed the mileage up to 130 for a basic day, cut the pools so the mile hogs could make the same money, hired a bunch of weekenders that wouldn't stay marked up, and we began getting longer layovers at the wrong end, then we were getting at home. Many a trip I got called at home with just 8 hrs off, then go to right back to Wellington and make heldaway (after 16 hrs in bed there). Not unusual to work three trips in a week, each being 30-36 hours or more start to finish. Which mean sometimes you were gone from home 90-100 hours a week. I've actually had round trips that took 40 hours, as much as most clock punchers spend on their job in a whole week. We used to be regulated to about 3600 miles a month, but that later got bumped up to 4200. Later they eliminated the requirement to mark off for miles. By the agreement, you could still lay off "MIL" if you actually had your miles in, but if you did, you had to wait for your checking period to start over, which might be several days, or a week away, which meant it whacked your pay check in half, so most just laid off sick, or personal business, back when you still could. But in the last few years before I retired, that got harder each time. Many times you had to lie, fight and argue with a crew clerk, or supervison who didn't want to hear it , just to have a day off. Loved the job, but posts like this make me glad I'm gone.