Western Railroad Discussion > why new trailers on the H-KCKGAL?

Anybody know why there are brand new trailers and containers on the H-KCKGAL-22, Kansas City to Galesburg?  They went by the Santa Fe Jct. (Kansas City) railcam at 08:53 and the La Plata, MO, railcam at 10:47 yesterday.  Do they manufacture trailers in Kansas or Missouri?  There are a lot of new trailers made in Baja California that go east on BNSF and UP Zs.  It’s been said on TO these new trailers get paying loads to where they will be accepted by the purchaser, so I wouldn’t expect to see these loaded trailers on a manifest.  The train had 76 manifest, 32 new trailers and containers, then 9 manifest, 2x0 power.  Three were ACT= AAA Cooper Transportation, 3 Swift containers on chassis, and 26 Estes trailers and containers with their nice yellow-painted ends.

mapboy

          New trailers have to start somewhere.

dcfbalcoS1 Wrote:
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>           New trailers have to start
> somewhere.

Yep, but where.  Mexico or the Midwest, and why on a manifest?  Another PSR wrinkle?

mapboy

mapboy Wrote:
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> dcfbalcoS1 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> >           New trailers have to start
> > somewhere.
>
> Yep, but where.  Mexico or the Midwest, and why
> on a manifest?  Another PSR wrinkle?
>
> mapboy

If they're not in service yet and earning revenue why pay extra to have them on an "Intermodal" train when you can use normal service that runs in manifests and save some money.
It's not like they have a schedule to keep.

PHall Wrote:
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> If they're not in service yet and earning revenue
> why pay extra to have them on an "Intermodal"
> train when you can use normal service that runs in
> manifests and save some money.
> It's not like they have a schedule to keep.

On TO it's been said that they are moving east with their first revenue load.  Makes sense to make some money en route to acceptance by the purchaser.  I've only seen them on Zs and Qs.  Seems the purchaser would want to get their equipment into service, the builder would want to get paid, why delay it on a manifest?  Something is different about this batch.  New normal for PSR?

mapboy

It doesn't make sense to stop an intermodal train to switch an industry, do air tests, etc, for new empty intermodal equipment. That's the work of a local crew not a high priority intermodal train.

Per TO's Milw_E70, the cars were set out by a Q train because Willow Springs couldn't handle them.  Eventually they were picked up by an H train for relay to Chicago.  A one-off move.

mapboy
 

The H-VBTVAW out here in Washington also had a cut of stacks in the middle of it today (probably picked up in Tacoma). Sometimes they will put them on whatever it takes to get them where they need to be. If there isn't a Q- or Z- available for a while, an H- will get them there faster then standing still.

Some yards work much better than others for advancing manifest traffic with intermodal.  In many areas there are separate yards for each.  Manifest traffic would come in on a train terminating in Everett, go on a transfer to Interbay in Seattle, then on another transfer taking the cars to SIG at Stacy Street Yard.  It would be picked up by a "S" marine stack train to Chicago.  It took 2-3 days to get from Everett onto an S train.

The intermodal that was picked up by the H-KCKGAL went to Galesburg, onto another train to Eola, then to Cicero.  Examples like this make me wonder if, like remote controlled locomotives, they are trying too hard to make PSR work.  A lot of these moves they are losing money and future business with the extra handling and transit time that PSR was supposed to reduce.

mapboy