Passenger Trains > Difference Between Rail Congestion & Freight Train Interference

When reading the Amtrak Alerts Tweets, for the reasons given that Amtrak trains are late, what is the difference between:

Rail Congestion
&
Freight Train Interference

"rail congestion" is what you say when you want to hide the true cause.

"freight train interference"  pins it Right down - and  points the finger at the freight railroads - God forbid, they should be held accountable for anything.

Yes, why should they be accountable? After all it's only their railroad.

Posted from Android

ronald321 Wrote:
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> "rail congestion" is what you say when you want to
> hide the true cause.
>
> "freight train interference"  pins it Right down
> - and  points the finger at the freight railroads
> - God forbid, they should be held accountable for
> anything.

What, exactly should they be held accountable for? Running a good business?

Posted from iPhone

ALCO630

If you were aware of the handling received by the Crescent - you couldn't say that with a straight face.

Is Amtrak entitled to nothing for the millions they pay freight railroads each year?

Absolutely - railroad should be held responsible for irresponsibility!

altoonafn Wrote:
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> What, exactly should they be held accountable for?
> Running a good business?
>

By what standard is the chaotic operation of US railroads a good business?

TAW

ALCO630 Wrote:
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> Yes, why should they be accountable? After all
> it's only their railroad.
>

I once worked for a project manager who defended failure to pay invoices by saying Contract? That's just words on paper.

Any similarity?

TAW

Altoonafan

Are you serious?  What should they be accountable for???

They should be accountable for running Amtrak trains on schedule!  -- or pay a penalty - just as UPS requires on the freight side.

They are getting away with murder (i.e., the sloppiest handling of passenger trains you can imagine).  Just check out Amtrak's O.T. performance  - and the degree of lateness (hours) involved.

The difference is the freight railroads want the UPS traffic and don't seem to want to Amtrak.

And Allentown, PA gets congested on a daily basis even without passenger trains. So the freight railroads aren't inventing congestion just to pick on poor old Amtrak.

Posted from Android

ALCO630 Wrote:
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> The difference is the freight railroads want the
> UPS traffic and don't seem to want to Amtrak.
>

Contract....just words on paper, etc.

Common carrier? Oh huh!

> And Allentown, PA gets congested on a daily
> basis even without passenger trains. So the
> freight railroads aren't inventing congestion just
> to pick on poor old Amtrak.
>

A lot of it is due to incompetence, actually.

TAW

I don't know if it's inconvenience or just nobody's in a big hurry.

Posted from Android

ALCO630 Wrote:
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> Yes, why should they be accountable? After all
> it's only their railroad.
>
> Posted from Android

Would you consider that an acceptable excuse if you were a freight shipper? BSB

Posted from iPhone

ALCO630 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The difference is the freight railroads want the
> UPS traffic and don't seem to want to Amtrak.
>
> And Allentown, PA gets congested on a daily
> basis even without passenger trains. So the
> freight railroads aren't inventing congestion just
> to pick on poor old Amtrak.

Isn't Allentown where they offload some freight onto trucks for I-78 for trips across NJ ? 
Allentown was never designed to be a terminus. God knows NS doesn't double or triple track everywhere they should. 

UPS gets stuck in NS's Autorouter meltdowns over the years too. 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/14/19 14:00 by joemvcnj.

ronald321 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Altoonafan
>
> Are you serious?  What should they be accountable
> for???
>
> They should be accountable for running Amtrak
> trains on schedule!  -- or pay a penalty - just
> as UPS requires on the freight side.
>
> They are getting away with murder (i.e., the
> sloppiest handling of passenger trains you can
> imagine).  Just check out Amtrak's O.T.
> performance  - and the degree of lateness (hours)
> involved.


Late trains are now comparable to murder. Unbelievable.

If the degree of offense and penalties were as terrible as Amtrak advocates claim, then Amtrak is grossly mismanaged. The fact is, they have gone after one railroad in nearly 50 years for this. Which leads me to believe there isn’t much of a case here.

Posted from iPhone

TAW Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> altoonafn Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
>
> > What, exactly should they be held accountable
> for?
> > Running a good business?
> >
>
> By what standard is the chaotic operation of US
> railroads a good business?
>
> TAW

The object of a business is to make money. The railroads are making record money. Perceived chaos is not indicative of a bad business model.

Posted from iPhone

altoonafn Wrote:

> The object of a business is to make money. The
> railroads are making record money. Perceived chaos
> is not indicative of a bad business model.

When "perceived" becomes "real" year after year, when the 2nd main track in western Indiana becomes a parking lot for 10 freights, or Amtrak is parked in Alabama for 4 hours, that is the (Wall Street) clowns running the circus, not good business, not for the freight customer, not for the economy. That is where Wall Street and Main Street diverge. NS has PSR yet to come, and will become like CN and CP in Alberta.

BigSkyBlue Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ALCO630 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Yes, why should they be accountable? After all
> > it's only their railroad.
> >
> > Posted from Android
>
> Would you consider that an acceptable excuse if
> you were a freight shipper? BSB
>
> Posted from iPhone

Quite honestly, I would ship by truck. It'll get there quicker.

altoonafn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> The object of a business is to make money. The
> railroads are making record money. Perceived chaos
> is not indicative of a bad business model.
>

That depends upon how you look at the amount of money you throw away while you're making money. They make a lot. They throw away a lot. Good business involves not throwing away any.

TAW

joemvcnj Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ALCO630 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > The difference is the freight railroads want
> the
> > UPS traffic and don't seem to want to Amtrak.
> >
> > And Allentown, PA gets congested on a daily
> > basis even without passenger trains. So the
> > freight railroads aren't inventing congestion
> just
> > to pick on poor old Amtrak.
>
> Isn't Allentown where they offload some freight
> onto trucks for I-78 for trips across NJ ? 
> Allentown was never designed to be a terminus. God
> knows NS doesn't double or triple track everywhere
> they should. 
>
> UPS gets stuck in NS's Autorouter meltdowns over
> the years too. 

Actually, the intermodal terminal is across the river in Bethlehem on the old Bethlehem steel property. I wasn't specifically referring to intermodal traffic I was referring to the general freight traffic that goes to Allentown yard it gets close to it gets to the yard and sits because the yard can't handle it. But I will say it's nothing new It was a problem in the Conrail and RDG/LV era as well.

Posted from Android

altoonafn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The object of a business is to make money. The
> railroads are making record money. Perceived chaos
> is not indicative of a bad business model.

When the primary objective of a business is to make money, the only benefit is of a short term nature to the owners, be they be private or public. Everyone else looses.