Western Railroad Discussion > West Colton yard closing

Has anyone head this? I received phone call yesterday asking me this question.My soufce was told this from one of his cronies in Omaha.

ButteSt Brakeman

How about a question mark in the subject line?

Picky-picky-picky, I think we could figure out whether or not this is a question. My reply to
the comment, wouldn't surprise me.

Out

      Many people will read the title and take off telling everyone they know with no further information, so YES, there should be a question mark after it to make sure the reader knows. Sloppy writing and punctuation is still required even though some of the folks deem it unnecessary. 

Highly unlikely, but nothing is off the table anymore.

???????????????????????????? There, that shoud do it.

Closing Bloomington Yard would be awesome. They already closed Taylor and diverted most of the flat switching from East Yard, CofI, and Dolores to Bloomington. All those carload customers in So Cal would be SOL. If guess if the end-game is to run off more customers, this would be a dandy strategy. 

ButteStBrakeman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Has anyone head this? I received phone call
> yesterday asking me this question.My soufce was
> told this from one of his cronies in Omaha.
>
> ButteSt Brakeman


I doubt it. The haulers from Dolores, Anaheim, Gemco, Jyard and Commerce all bring copious cars to be humped and routed east and north. The haulers also haul cars to those destinations as well.
I was on a work train that dumped the first car of ballast at WC yard in 1973 during construction. I guess will be on the work train when the railroad is dismantled !

Posted from Android



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/19 06:45 by SanJoaquinEngr.

Perhaps referring to closing the hump, not shutting down the entire yard.  UP is on a mission to close hump yards.  One of the PSR tenets...

Go from 2,000 cars a shift to 200 if the hump is closed

WAF Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Go from 2,000 cars a shift to 200 if the hump is
> closed

2000 cars a shift? West Colton was averaging less than 1500 a day before PSR.

portlander Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> 2000 cars a shift? West Colton was averaging less
> than 1500 a day before PSR.

If you have 2000 cars a shift, you are counting cars on through trains which do not get switched.

ts1457 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> portlander Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > 2000 cars a shift? West Colton was averaging
> less
> > than 1500 a day before PSR.
>
> If you have 2000 cars a shift, you are counting
> cars on through trains which do not get switched.

Yup.

portlander Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> WAF Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Go from 2,000 cars a shift to 200 if the hump
> is
> > closed
>
> 2000 cars a shift? West Colton was averaging less
> than 1500 a day before PSR.
I meant per day

In 2013, UP listed West Colton as humping 1100 cars per day average:

https://www.up.com/investors/attachments/secfiling/2014/upc10k_020714.pdf   See page 15.  That is the last year I can find that UP reported hump and ramp volumes.

The "run through" traffic passing West Colton is intermodal, automotive, unit aggregate, and occasional unit trains to the harbor or a couple of grain facilities (ie: Verhoeven Grain at Vina Vista).  I'm not aware of any manifest traffic that does not get humped at West Colton. There is some that moves to/from Sunset Route to I-5 Corridor that is humped at West Colton.  Is this significant?

Otherwise, West Colton seems to be more of a parking lot. As UP continues pruning single-carload and even smaller shippers from its network, and won't consider selling/leasing LA Basin branches to a shortline who would likely grow the business rather than de-market it, I think the mainfest traffic that West Colton exists for will continue to shrink. 

Much of the LA Basin traffic left after the auto plants and heavy manufacturing disappeared was boxcar and forest products traffic (construction lumber and paper). As DCs shifted their business/logistics models, boxcars are, for the most part, irrelevant. Chemical traffic in the Basin is likely as much as it will get. And with construction down as dramatically as it is, and the nature of new housing changing, plus the shrinking of printing, the UP manifest base in the Basin will continue to shrink. So it's not unthinkable that West Colton could get down to 900, 800 or even fewer cars being sorted.  At what point does it make sense to close the hump?  Does it make sense to now rebuild COI into a flat-switched manifest yard and move the intermodal traffic to a converted West Colton ramp?  (which would cut down on drayage costs for the Inland Empire's huge DC base considerable).  Or does UP just say to hell with it and sell off some or a lot of West Colton land and give more back to shareholders? (the COI suggestion part tongue-in-cheek, part "creative" thinking....)   

But likely UP operations in the Los Angeles Basin will not look the same in 5 or 10 years.

Bruce

StStephen Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ... As UP continues pruning
> single-carload and even smaller shippers from its
> network, and won't consider selling/leasing LA
> Basin branches to a shortline who would likely
> grow the business rather than de-market it, I
> think the mainfest traffic that West Colton exists
> for will continue to shrink...
>
> But likely UP operations in the Los Angeles Basin
> will not look the same in 5 or 10 years.
>
> Bruce

I like the idea of UP leasing out the LA Basin branches and keeping trackage rights for UP's mainline trains.  Someone like PHL would drum up so much business that UP would have to make more money with the increased long haul traffic and elimination of expensive (to UP) collection/sorting/distribution.

mapboy

mapboy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I like the idea of UP leasing out the LA Basin
> branches and keeping trackage rights for UP's
> mainline trains.  Someone like PHL would drum up
> so much business that UP would have to make more
> money with the increased long haul traffic and
> elimination of expensive (to UP)
> collection/sorting/distribution.
>
> mapboy

We can hope. 

Well then I guess the second hump lead they tell us they are going to build won't happen. Then again it might. The railroad is always improving things or painting buildings before they tear them down.