Eastern Railroad Discussion > FreightCar America moving to Mexico

Yesterday they announced the closure of their Shoals, Alabama plant at the end of this year. This is a sad blow to that region but maybe the displaced employees can find new work across the River at the upcoming Toyota/Mazda automobile plant. The second link states FCA will be moving into a new facility 1/5th size of their current Alabama facility. It feels like FCA is slowly phasing itself out of freight car building altogether. With Roanoke closed late last year, the Shoals plant was their only domestic plant left. I guess they’ll need to change their name now, since they will no longer be building railroad cars in the USA.


https://www.al.com/business/2020/09/freightcar-america-closing-shoals-plant.html

https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/09/10/2092119/0/en/FreightCar-America-Inc-Announces-Additional-Steps-in-Manufacturing-and-Operational-Realignment.html

"FreightCar NorthAmerica"

trinity industires said last week they were looking at moving to mexico also

Did anyone tell Trump that they were moving to Mexico?  I thought he was bringing all the jobs back.

green Wrote:
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> trinity industires said last week they were
> looking at moving to mexico also

Isn’t Trinity already in Mexico? I don’t think they build in the US anymore.

Posted from iPhone

story was in the wall street journal last week. they have at least one plant there already

Don’t worry.

China will start making boxcars at half the cost of Mexico and put them out of business too.

One of the downsides to a global industrial economy is a race to the bottom for cheap labor, loose business regulations, and government tax incentives for the company.

Maybe kits to get them across the ocean easier and so they can say they were manufactured in the U.S.A. 

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com


RGTower Wrote:
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> Don’t worry.
>
> China will start making boxcars at half the cost
> of Mexico and put them out of business too.
>
 

This could be a prelude to some big boxcar orders by U.S. railroads.  We've all read about the "boxcar shortage", and the price of replacing them.

If the RR's would run faster, transfer faster, switch faster, they could get more turns per car.  Thus, the expense of replacing them is "high" with U.S. made cars, but really it's U.S. RR made problem due to very poor velocity.  If they made more money per car, the replacement costs would be justified.

Most truck trailers and tractors are still made in the U.S.---and trucking is very high velocity with regards to equipment use.