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General railway discussions
- Thread starter Urban Sky
- Start date
lenaitch
Senior Member
What does any of this have to do with "transit"?
Urban Sky
Senior Member
The name of this thread is „General railway discussions“ and is located in the „Transportation and Infrastructure“ area of this forum. I‘ve deliberately created it to prevent such random rail discussions from polluting the „VIA Rail“ thread, where they undoubtedly would be off-topic. In this particular thread, just the fact that HBR receives money is sufficiently on-topic…
nfitz
Superstar
I haven't seen anyone discussing whether it was on topic or not.
lenaitch
Senior Member
I wasn't making a point whether or not it was on topic. I was wondering how a discussion about private and public money going to heavy rail and port improvements related to transit funding . I would have been equally as curious if it had been argued that the money would be better spent on on housing, health care or defence.
Urban Sky
Senior Member
I still don‘t find your original comment clear, but I think I get it now: you are pointing out some kind of whataboutism, where someone said „why don’t we spend this money on Y instead of X?“, to which you respond „what is the link between spending money on X and spending money on Y?“ and indeed, we can discuss the value of spending money on X just like we can discuss that of spending money on Y, but unless causes X and Y are in direct competition for the same funding pots, there is no reason to play them out against each other…
Bordercollie
Senior Member
Trade, and logistics is a huge contributor to our economy. All of our ports that connect to an ocean are full. Most major great lake ports are for bulk shipping but are too small compared to ocean bound vessels because it is limited to the size of the Welland Canal. Using the Hudson Bay Port ships would not be limited in size and if they could do intermodal freight then container ships could dock there and use rail to get to Ontario and Quebec. This avoids the capacity limitations through the Rocky's.
Why wouldn't you feel that this would be a benefit? Cheaper pricing for your laptops and help with the supply chain issues we have today.
lenaitch
Senior Member
I think it's a wonderful idea. I was responding to another poster who questioned the expenditure and felt the money would be better spent on transit, to which I wondered what one had to do with the other.
crs1026
Superstar
Cando just issued a short promotional video about their operations - it's here.
While it is a PR tool, it's actually both articulate and instructional in relation to the "first mile - last mile" logistics - and how they are filling a niche that the big railways don't want to fill (perhaps wrongly, but reality is what it is).
The fact that they operate in so many locations does make one think they have a good handle on the rail freight customer interface. And when they dump an operation (as they did with OBRY, for instance) it suggests that even they don't see a way of making the thing work - which makes the abandonment credible.
This is germaine to the whole issue of branch lines, abandonments, and how to avoid them. Well worth looking past the "spin" - there is a message in here.
- Paul
While it is a PR tool, it's actually both articulate and instructional in relation to the "first mile - last mile" logistics - and how they are filling a niche that the big railways don't want to fill (perhaps wrongly, but reality is what it is).
The fact that they operate in so many locations does make one think they have a good handle on the rail freight customer interface. And when they dump an operation (as they did with OBRY, for instance) it suggests that even they don't see a way of making the thing work - which makes the abandonment credible.
This is germaine to the whole issue of branch lines, abandonments, and how to avoid them. Well worth looking past the "spin" - there is a message in here.
- Paul
lenaitch
Senior Member
^^ They have filled the niche of operating shortlines and inland terminals. What has been lost is the customer on single siding along a Class 1 mainline; the small factory, grain terminal, lumber mill or mine/quarry. A third party operator can't really service those and the Class 1s don't seem to want them because of their high cost/low profit.
Bordercollie
Senior Member
That's partially due to their over obsession with profits. I think it's good that the government recognizes that these links are important to our economy.
crs1026
Superstar
I won’t deny the profit motive, but don’t discount the differences in business model and the efficiency factor. Local trains consume mainline capacity, and accomplish fewer train miles per labour hour. The customer interface, and the back-room side of that interface (the connection between customer request, the operations planning, and the operations side) looks a lot different for local services.
Delivering railcars is a lot different than delivering the mail. You don’t just drop a railcar in a siding and leave. Cars may need to be shifted, the cars that were delivered today may not be the customer’s highest priority to spot for unloading, there may be urgency for some car that is still en route where the cars that are on hand may be the raw materials for next month’s production. Not all railcars being delivered have exactly the same substance inside - each car may have a slightly different custom order chemistry tied to a particular production run - and there may be best-before timing to shipments.
The Class 1’s don’t want to get involved in any of that. Their core business model has been refined to just moving the goods from one hub to another. That’s why they love transload and intermodal…. just put the load on a trailer and let somebody else drive it away. Tell the customer that the local only runs Tuesday and Friday and they better live with that..
Good shortline/terminal service delivers that responsiveness. It’s costly but it’s something customers will often pay for. It takes a lot more local knowledge and flexibility. It’s the same difference as between a discount airline that drops you in Europe and a travel agent who books all your hotels and attraction admissions and arranges where you have dinner every night.
- Paul
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Urban Sky
Senior Member
This is certainly an extreme case cherry-picked by the ARR, but it nonetheless illustrates why Class I railroads hate the first and last Mile:
Allandale25
Senior Member
One would think if any party in power would be open to investing and restoring the line it would be the NDP or the Greens but that appears not to be the case here.
www.cheknews.ca
Rob Shaw: Premier says E&N rail unlikely to restart, despite close proximity to new Langford university campus
B.C. Premier John Horgan says he's not confident rail service will get back up and running on Vancouver Island, as a court-imposed deadline to make a decision approaches.
www.cheknews.ca
Northern Light
Superstar
Excellent Video!
Of course, it also make a clear case for completely upending the entire rail industry in order to resolve such nonsensical dis-efficiency.
The moment the track is nationalized or otherwise becomes full-common carrier, you radically cut the complexity of such operations and the number of moves required.
This, of course, is how highways operate; imagine if trucks could only operate alone roads/highways owned by their trucking company? That sound absurd on its face; but then it can be no less absurd in rail.
Rail companies should own the cars, and manage the staff/logistics that operate them, but not the actual rail. A curiosity that it hasn't unfolded that way, since it would actually benefit the bottom line enormously.
Once the track is common carrier, it means that movements between different tracks can be optimized, including yard storage.
This would also improve competition and, in theory lower costs.
As an interim matter, I would argue for legislating universal running rights and a fixed fee so that trains can begin using anyone's tracks; existing runs get grandfathered preferential slots; but after that, first come, first serve.
Now, bear with me, I'm going to be marginally fanciful here, but this is not meant to be absurd over-reach, merely looking ahead a bit to where I think last movement should be....
I don't understand why end customers don't have limited push-pull power on-site, the idea of having a mainline loco do on-property maneuvering seems needlessly painful.
For clarity, I'm not suggesting that on-site power needs to be an industry owned loco, there are lots of ways to shift cars around, you can use any number of forms of winch system (think pulling a roller coaster up hill); you can do this from under a train, alongside a train or overhead. You simply need the power, and a place to attach it to the lead car. Train car breaks should really have blue-tooth at this point.
Alternatively, one can obviously use much smaller powered vehicles (vs mainline locos) for small movements.
Also, looking at the runarounds has me wondering why turntables aren't more common. Seems like it was a very practical idea.