[Homestead] The Frustration of Addressing Real Problems
Don Bowen
don.bowen at earthlink.net
Tue Apr 15 19:49:00 EDT 2008
>Truckers currently have the biggest "voice" in Congress. The rail lines
>are
>far more efficient. We see that problem here in CA where massive
>quantities
>of produce *used* to be "trucked" by rail but are now clogging up the
>freeways and sucking down the fuel. Now the rail lines are either being
>torn up and turned into "urban paths" or left lying to rot.
It is a little more complex than that. Trucks can deliver produce faster
than rail. The cost is higher but trucks are faster. Railroads have mostly
given up on perishable loads. With federal and union rules when a train
crew times out a train may be left standing on some remote siding until a
new crew can be brought out.
Railroads have long since given up on what used to be called LCL freight or
Less than Car Load. This was the Railway Express where a single package
could be dropped off at a station. Now even the stations are gone.
Railroads now would rather have unit trains, a train of a single commodity.
Coal trains are a prime example, a train of a single cargo, fill it up, take
it some where and dump it, then go back to fill it up. It is easy to
schedule. Trains of containers are another example, load a long train at
Long Beach then haul it to a terminal somewhere where it is unloaded and the
containers moved to trucks.
In fact the amount of container movement out of Long Beach required another
track and to keep speeds the track had to be sunk below streets and
freeways. Santa Fe is busily putting in double and triple tracks to speed
up container movement. UP has four tracks in some areas to speed movement
of coal trains. They are trying to double track some of the SP line but SP
mismanagement is slowing that down.
It is a shame that many branch lines were torn up, we will need them before
too long.
Don Bowen KI6DIU
http://www.braingarage.com/Dons/Travels/journal/Journal.html
More information about the Homestead
mailing list