Eastern Railroad Discussion > CSXT Business Train in Chicago

The CSXT’s business car train has been parked in Chicago Union Station the last few days. I’ve heard it is departing for points east at 6:00 am tomorrow 3/15/23. No idea what route.

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Amtrak people on the train talking to CSX people??

No, met Joe Hinrichs tonight at the Railroader of the Year event tonight and he said they were going to the train at Union Station.

It's making a Chicago - Willard - NWO - Detroit - Grand Rapids - Chicago round trip.  Cue to conspiracy theories on the future of the Plymouth and Grans Rapids Subs.  

scraphauler Wrote:
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> It's making a Chicago - Willard - NWO - Detroit -
> Grand Rapids - Chicago round trip.  Cue to
> conspiracy theories on the future of the Plymouth
> and Grans Rapids Subs.  


What conspiracies? It's clear they have no future. At least with CSX.

rantoul Wrote:
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> CSX executive Barr was just hired by UP.

Maybe Hinrich’s gave him a ride to Chicago where the UP biz train can pick him up for his move to Omaha. 😉

CW

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A need to get PSR in higher gear at UP since it was such a success with CSX???  Someone to kill the steam program?

Victor Baird

rantoul Wrote:
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> CSX executive Barr was just hired by UP.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/15/23 21:30 by wabash2800.

scraphauler Wrote:
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> It's making a Chicago - Willard - NWO - Detroit -
> Grand Rapids - Chicago round trip.  Cue to
> conspiracy theories on the future of the Plymouth
> and Grans Rapids Subs.  


Glad it didn’t turn left at Deshler or the Toledo sub would be on the same list.

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scraphauler Wrote:
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> It's making a Chicago - Willard - NWO - Detroit -
> Grand Rapids - Chicago round trip.  Cue to
> conspiracy theories on the future of the Plymouth
> and Grand Rapids Subs.  

You can call the visits to Michigan by an OCS and the future status of the Plymouth and Grand Rapids Subs "conspiracy theories" if you want to. But this is now the third trip by a CSX inspection train through Michigan, and particularly over the relatively lightly trafficked Grand Rapids Sub, in the last two years or so. Three visits by an OCS train over relatively lightly trafficked lines anywhere in less than two years would be quite unusual. In addition to this visit, previous visits were noted on TO:

8/25/21 post: 8/25/21 CSX OCS on the Plymouth Sub in Michigan (trainorders.com)
8/18/22 post: CSX OCS (trainorders.com)

Note again: a key traffic source on the Grand Rapids Sub, Consumers Energy's J.H. Campbell Generating Station at West Olive, Mich.,  between Grand Haven and Holland on the Lake Michigan shore, is going to be closing much sooner than previously anticipated. Closure of the three coal-fired units at Campbell was not originally planned until 2031, with one unit perhaps to operate even longer. The closure is now planned for 2025. That will be a major traffic hit for the Grand Rapids Sub, which handles several unit western coal trains a week for Campbell coming off BNSF at Chicago.

That closure will be a significant traffic loss for CSX. With only one through freight each way daily on either side of Grand Rapids (to/from Chicago, and to/from Detroit), and very few other replacement traffic prospects in sight, it's not improbable that they would be looking for a regional partner to lease operation of the railroad, or buy it outright. Or (a much longer shot) another Class 1 who would have some interest in having this route for traffic penetration or capacity they otherwise would not have.

This isn't a conspiracy theory. It's hard economic logic.

MC



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 03/15/23 21:27 by ironmtn.

Hopefully the state of Michigan can buy these lines and hire a freight operator.  Plymouth to Grand Rapids to Porter, Indiana would be a nice short line railroad.  

Plymouth/GR Subs picked up a new piece of business this week, possibly to the detriment of the Toledo Sub.  Cleveland Cliffs (former AK Steel) is starting to move Rouge produced billets to their rolling mill in Burns Harbor via Grand Rapids.  First cut was one day this week - believe yesterday's L302 has 30 or 35 on him.   Not sure if Burns Harbor is replacing Middletown OH as location to roll, of if it's addition to Middletown.  If replacement, traffic will could result in a new train up there.

CSXT under Hinrich SEEMS to be going after car load business and trying to grow traffic.  Jury is still out of if they are truly serious, but they are talking a good game right now.   Under Foote, I would have said this P001 was probably full of RJ Corman, Watco, and G&W folks getting ready for a bidding war to take it over.  But with the recent attitude changes and seeing shoots of traffic growth trying to take root on some other lighter density lines. I'm not so sure we'll see any large line divestitures.  Time will tell.  

That's great news - thanks for sharing it. Yes, it may not be a net traffic gain - sounds more like a reroute than new traffic. And sorry it may hurt the Toledo Sub. I saw that slab train on the Toledo Sub a few years ago. Impressive, and good traffic.

But maybe the move to a new routing will help in some way to better utilize the railroad, and make room for further development of other traffic. And it will probably help the Grand Rapids and Plymouth Subs.

Glad to know that Mr. Hinrichs is thought to be going after new traffic, and hopefully isn't afraid of good carload traffic. A long overdue move. This very small CSX shareholder is liking him more all the time.

MC

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I grew up along the Plymouth Sub. And I remember well the contract trains CSX operated for CP until 2010 (it was just X500 for the last five years to run out the contract - the majority switched to the NS routing via Butler, IN in 2005).

In the middle of the contract, in the mid-90s, CP reportedly made a pass at CSX for the line. At that time CSX still had three had three round trip trains per day running from Flint, Detroit and Toledo to Grand Rapids and Chicago, in addition to Eastern Coal moving to West Olive, and gave CP an astronomical price tag for it. They walked and subsequent poor handling of the trains led to the trackage rights deal with NS, at the same time CSX responded to the crash of industry in Detroit and Flint and started cutting back on their own traffic.

Supposedly, CP and CSX looked at a sale again on more favorable terms about 7 years ago and this time CP decided not to bite, but did make a deal for a modern contract arrangement to move double stacks on CSX from Chicago to Buffalo which operate as I165 and I166 today.

I don’t need to mention of course that CP just got massively bigger and is now poised to compete much more fiercely with CN and others… but they still don’t have a line they control between Chicago and Canada and NS has not played well with them wanting to add trains to the Chicago Line and Detroit District.

I know a lot of people will tell me I’m crazy - but just maybe, the third time might be the charm for CP to have their own line between Chicago and Detroit.

I don’t predict this will be soon. They’ll have enough on their plate merging KCS and CSX still has two full years of hauling Powder River coal up the shore of Lake Michigan. But I think if CSX and CP came to the table again, this time it might work…

Time will tell.

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Not wanting to be a wet blanket, however it has been reported the big wigs got off the train just outside of Plymouth MI.  It was empty from Plymouth to Barr.

MEKoch Wrote:
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> Hopefully the state of Michigan can buy these
> lines and hire a freight operator.  Plymouth to
> Grand Rapids to Porter, Indiana would be a nice
> short line railroad.  

Even better, given their track record, the state of Michigan
could buy the line and convert to high speed rail.
 

I would love to see Passenger Service between Grand Rapids, my native Lansing (stop would inevitably be East Lansing at the existing station there) and Detroit. However, it’s not a corridor worthy of high speed investment in the same way the Michigan Line is.

There was an a “coast to coast” study done a few years but nothing came of it. With Democrats in complete and total control of the state government for the first time in a generation, it is possible the needle could be moved on passenger rail expansion but it would take a lot of will to even do a “quick start” service on this line - which I think should be a second Pere Marquette that runs straight through Grand Rapids and turns back at Detroit or Pontiac.

The conditions of the line and infrastructure already in place - including the aforementioned East Lansing station and the Michigan Avenue / CP-LOU connection from the CSX Detroit Sub to Conrail Michigan Line in Dearborn - mean start up costs for a simple service might be drastically lower than average. But even with conditions the best they’ve been to even discuss this, I wouldn’t expect any movement to occur on it.

As for the OCS, I can confirm what Typhoon said. The executives exited at New Boston to go to Detroit Metro Airport and the train returned to Chicago essentially empty.

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