Eastern Railroad Discussion > NS retirements compared to CN's Roster

I saw a post from NSDash9.com yesterday indicating NS had retired all of the remaining 126 SD70M-2's, which were built in 2005-2006. I saw comments that they were full of problems, which could explain it. Then I looked back farther at the wide range of engines NS retired in 2020 - SD75M's, failed rebuilds, some C44-9W's (not going to rebuilding), and much more. NS no longer rosters any SD70-series engines except for SD70ACe's, and no longer has C40-8W's or unrebuilt SD60's.

So perhaps 15-16 year old SD70M-2's are garbage - but how does CN manage, rostering even more of them? They even repainted one as a heritage unit recently. Otherwise, it is interesting to compare what I saw on CN in Febuary in Chicago in this post to NS's roster: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,5203694,page=1

In that post, there are multiple road freights where the entire consist is engines NS has purged, because there are still tons of SD70/SD70I/SD75I/SD70-2's, C40-8W's, C40-8M's, C44-9W's, and SD60's. I'm absolutely not ruling out that CN is running all of that older power ragged and it could be awful to work in, but it is an interesting comparision to what NS's roster has become.

I attached a few photos from that post of recent CN consist where all units would be off roster if was NS. When I see these powersets I'm thinking "oh, usual power", not "last chance to get this rare consist!"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/21 09:26 by inCHI.

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The main reason is NS, through poor management, has bitten off more than they can handle with this PSR crap.  ANYONE who worked their way up through the ranks knows that RR's are fickle beasts at best. NS has very little TRUE railroaders left in management.  They filled the ranks with pencil pushing, bean counting college prep boys, mostly from VMI, starting in the 80's. 90% of these idiots didn't know the diffence between a gon and any other car (I heard actual conversations like this daily).  The results are now showing up as none of them have any real idea what they need to do to turn their sinking ship around, and never will.  NS will flounder on for a while, the pencil pushers and shareholders will bleed it dry, and they will all walk away with full pockets and leave what's left for someone else to pick up.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/21 11:19 by willobi.

Warren is probably watching, knowing when the time is right he can get it at a good price.

Posted from iPhone

biff Wrote:
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> Warren is probably watching, knowing when the time
> is right he can get it at a good price.
>
> Posted from iPhone

Even if the price is right, he's going to need another player to be interested in part of the network, as no way do they allow a BNSF + NS merger.

I love how it's always the "college kids" fault on this, but if you look at the post and compare to the NSDash9 site, those SD70M-2s were sold to Progress Rail.  My guess is that anything under 20 years old still has a capital value associated it with, thus you don't just "trash" or scrap it.  Yes, PSR is supposed to (emphasize: SUPPOSED TO) reduce motive power needs (again, insert buzzy business words like: asset utilization, return on net assets, blah blah) but I think the bigger thrust here is that NS would rather standardize around AC traction and specific locomotive types for maintenance simplicity.  I don't need an MBA to know that's an easy way to reduce costs no matter what scale of business.  
The comment above about "lack of railroaders" can be applied to all levels, not just management.  Let's face it, it's hard to find talent at all levels, let alone train them and invest in them.  Thus, if you can make the task easier for the workforce (like running and fixing locomotives of multiple types) you broaden your pool of potential employees.  On top of this, railroading like most other industries is no longer a "cradle to grave" type employment, partially because of employee mentality, and partially because of corporate idealogy of "benchmarking" benefits amongst peer companies.  It doesn't help companies stand out from eachother if everyone offers the same benefits.  Thus employees don't have a motive to stay for a long time.
Sorry for my rant, but I think NS has just finally moved into the 21st century and determined AC traction is best use of their money,
-Sean
Ankeny, IA

Getting back to the original discussion, CN has taken the same approach with BNSF & UP GE as well. They were probably not the best loved locomotives on those RRs, but CN is using them every day.

Subsdized by the Canadian government to lure railfans to Canada! BNSF looked at the not quite 15 year old SD75s and decided to at least try
and rebuild them. Did like 17 units and gave up, the newer stuff is just that much better. Anything not using the 184 day maintenance cycle is pretty
much on borrowed time.

Out 

CN is taking the time and money to overhaul their SD70M-2s, so they'll likely be staying on CN for a bit... They contracted a lot of it through AMP in Dansville along with many of the older still SD75Is... CN for some reason still sees worth in them...

NS though, on their PSR purge of all assets possible, feels they've been problematic and crews despise them, so when they came due for overhaul, they got the boot instead... Meanwhile Juniata is (or at least was) performing full overhauls on the 7500 and 7600 DC GEVOs, as they've performed much better...

The rails at NS seem happy that the junk is gone but one would wonder what those 130 units would have done for a railroad that's deliberately making itself short on power... But WTF do I know?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/21 13:25 by MC6853.

Got to remember that CN has been woefully short of power for a few years.  You don't scrap working locomotives when you don't hyave enough to move the freight

Does the railroad industry have a high turnover of employees after five years?

I always thought that five years in meant you were there for life. Wages, benefits, health ins, pension, etc.

Posted from Android

saw the 2666 in a westbound consist yesterday @ Chattanooga Tn   3/21

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Maybe CN got better management and better mechanics. Just that simple.

Posted from Android

Kind of ironic how NS was the last Class 1 railroad to embrace AC technology/traction but going on your deductive reasoning it does seem that NS is banking on AC technology/traction in the future...

NS was also the last major railroad to abandon regular use of steam locomotives.

If it is paid for, and it works, use it!

Posted from Android

There may be a financial angle to this.  Many leases run for 15 or 20 years,so the company may decide that necessary class repairs won't pay for themselves in the remaining term of the lease.

Lackawanna484 Wrote:
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> NS was also the last major railroad to abandon
> regular use of steam locomotives.
>
> If it is paid for, and it works, use it!
>
> Posted from Android

NS didn’t exist till 1982. N&W was one of the last US Class 1 to fully dieselize. Southern was one of the first.

Posted from iPhone



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/06/21 08:30 by Juniata.

drsilverstreak Wrote:
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> Got to remember that CN has been woefully short of
> power for a few years.  You don't scrap working
> locomotives when you don't hyave enough to move
> the freight

Good point. I'm also seeing unproven rumors now that NS is also short.

willobi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The main reason is NS, through poor management,
> has bitten off more than they can handle with this
> PSR crap.  ANYONE who worked their way up through
> the ranks knows that RR's are fickle beasts at
> best. NS has very little TRUE railroaders left in
> management.  They filled the ranks with pencil
> pushing, bean counting college prep boys, mostly
> from VMI, starting in the 80's. 90% of these
> idiots didn't know the diffence between a gon and
> any other car (I heard actual conversations like
> this daily).  The results are now showing up as
> none of them have any real idea what they need to
> do to turn their sinking ship around, and never
> will.  NS will flounder on for a while, the
> pencil pushers and shareholders will bleed it dry,
> and they will all walk away with full pockets and
> leave what's left for someone else to pick up.

I think TO ought to adopt this response as the Official Best Answer for Anything.

--Why did that train derail?
"The main reason is NS, through poor management, ..."

--Why am I not seeing as much run-through power that I used to like to photograph?
"The main reason is NS, through poor management, ..."

--Why did we see train X at place Y when I'm not used to seeing that?
"The main reason is NS, through poor management, ..."

... and so on. Maybe instead of the full rant next time, we could somehow have [Standard Answer for All] as an automatic reply to every post just to get it over with early.
 

So it's mostly DC units getting the boot by NS---what were the short list of problems with the EMD units?  Electrical issues / ghosts?  Failed engine components?  

biff Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Warren is probably watching, knowing when the time
> is right he can get it at a good price.
>
> Posted from iPhone

That would be FANTASTIC.  Create a true, transcon RR, privately-held, managed better.  Could do wonders.  BNSF seems to be making better decisions while privately held under Mr. Buffett.