General railway discussions

[crs1026]

I can't imagine adding a single customer on a low performing line would be a terrible hassle, and not improve the financial performance of the line.

Of course, that presumes the connection is a short one that isn't overly costly to build.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but some considerations that I would imagine CPKC would mull over

- The route is slow speed, and the train is often close to hours by the time it gets to Agincourt or Havelock. Would the added stop risk a crew timing out?
- Suppose the new spur is a simple one with one switch, points facing west. Not a hard job to pick up a westbound car on the way to Agincourt. But - what will it take to spot a car coming east? Most likely the car will have to travel all the way to Havelock and come back the following day on a westbound train. Added car-miles and an added day of car cost for each shipment and maybe switching time and effort at Havelock.
- Now you have the mineral train arriving Agincourt with a single car that needs to be switched out and transferred to some other train. How does that jive with the operating pattern at the yard? What's the likely layover time of that car and will it be in the way of something else while it sits? Where is the destination of the car and where is the block of cars that it has to be attached to so that it moves on as planned?
- What is the eventual origin/destination of the car? (If CPKC gets to haul it all the way to/from Manitoba, it will be lucrative.... but if the car is handed over to say CSX in Buffalo, CP doesn't get many line-haul miles of revenue for its efforts)(And CSX may demand the lion's share of the tariff, these are not necessarily split between railways proportionate to mileage alone)
- What is the impact on car supply? Will CPKC have to hold empty cars at Agincourt waiting for a service request? Where will the empty cars come from/ go to before and after the shipment? What kind of cars and how available are they? How far do empties have to travel and is there a backhaul possible? Does the customer intend to store product in some number of cars at site (many do)?
- How many cars a month is the business likely to generate? (what is doable for 20 cars/month may not be remunerative for one car a month)
- Is a transload at Agincourt simpler and easier?

I am just spitballing here, the point is simply to demonstrate that what seems like an easy proposition for the customer may not look attractive to the business. Calling up a freight car to be loaded at your siding is not the same as calling an Uber, and delivering a freight car for unloading is not the same as ordering from Doordash.

- Paul

 

[drum118]

I've been riding the rails more and often look at factories or warehouses that have spur lines to connect them to the mainlines. There's many of these on the Lakeshore West GO line.

How does a company get a spur line? For example, we want to open a feed mill in Pontypool, ON where the line to Peterborough splits at the old grain elevator.

Ontario Railway Network (ORWN)

This dataset provides enhanced spatial and attribute data for a suite of seven data classes that form the Ontario Railway Network.

geohub.lio.gov.on.ca

Assuming you have the environmental and zoning approvals, do you just call up CN/CP and ask for a spur line? What does it cost?

And if one was shopping for an industrial site, how do you know if it has a spur line? It's not a drop down on realtor.ca or commercial real estate sites I've seen.

There are many spur sidings on LSW, but most haven't been used in years to the point switches have been removed for them. A good one is the north platform for Burlington GO station as you can now walk to/from the platform to/from the parking structure and the bus terminal over the area where a track used to be. To service any sidings still in service, the local switcher between Aldershot and Oakville will pickup/drop off cars as needed.

As it been noted, does that siding make good sense to the RR and what kind of impact will it have on service for the line. One can say this about TTC Hillcrest siding that was built to delivery the new streetcars. Once all the fist batch of 204 cars were delivery as well the 66 cars that were shipped to/from Quebec, the siding saw no more deliveries or pickup until the current 60 were to be delivery. What will happen to the siding once those 60 cars are all here as well the 2 missing cars for the next 20 or so years until a new fleet is order to replace the current fleet???

There used to be a siding at TTC Greenwood yard for delivery of subway cars and it was removed after the T1's arrived(?) that all of the TR's had to be truck to Wilson Yard.

If you look closely at buildings along the RR corridors that may have a siding or could see one, what type of business exist there that would justify having cars drop or or pick-up there as well how often. Most of those build have low height that may need the need of a businesses, but a lot are out dated where they need 40-60' height to meet their needs and one reasons what some companies relocated elsewhere and went all trucking on cheap land by sell land expensive land in some cases.

 

[lenaitch]

Hence the reason why the Class 1 railways prefer LCL, 'loose freight' and light service to be moved over to the roads. Shortline operators can more easily get by because a lot of their business is bulk and they have cheaper and more flexible labour costs.

I imagine if an unused siding is still in place the RR would be more inclined to reactivate it, particularly if a switcher already works the area, but I imagine it would be more complex to reactivate one if it is in CTC territory.

 

[lenaitch]

I can't see any current splits of the line near Pontypool, but I do see evidence of a former one, mostly lost to forest:

I believe that is just a road allowance/former road. It seems to follow the general survey baseline for the area. There were crossing/joining branches west of there at Burketon and a couple east of there near Cavan.

 

[drum118]

10 train carriages that are now amazing tiny homes​

 

[dowlingm]

Firstly, I am taking everything @crs1026 as true as the current state of freight offering.

That said, at some point we may have to confront the reality of an industry tuned to the convenience of shareholders rather than to maximize the ability to shift freight off the roads. (And by that I don’t mean all freight, just shifting the convenience/cost curves to allow a higher mode shift)

We don’t see MTO permanently reducing 400 series highways to 60km/h so that they can reduce lane widths and thereby paving costs, or closing off-ramps because a vehicle audit showed insufficient use. We don’t see them permitting only certain truck companies to operate over them, or even only Ontario registered ones. The indirect cost recovery from the heaviest vehicles causing the most wear and tear is not sufficient to dissuade more and move movements, driving demands for widenings and bypasses at the expense of the general taxpayer.

But we have rail alignments, which are expensive and difficult to create, allowed to degrade to the point where only the most profitable traffic is worth moving over it, and if that remainder goes discontinuance follows. Meanwhile municipalities grub away at the property taxes they can get from their existence, helping push the colour of the spreadsheets from black to red.

What are we doing?

 

[Bojaxs]

I thought this was an interesting announcement. Former 2012 Olympic land in East London to be converted into a "master planned" freight rail, logistics hub.

Network Rail plan for major east London rail freight and logistics hub approved | New Civil Engineer

The London Legacy Development Corporation has unanimously approved the plan, which is the first independent planning submission from Network Rail

www.newcivilengineer.com

As North America tries to figure out how to improve and increase passenger rail on their networks, Europe on the other hand is desperately trying to figure out how to improve and increase freight rail on their networks.

Interesting to note, one of the motivations for HS2 in England is to take passengers trains off the existing network and transfer them onto the dedicated HS network. In doing so, this would help to increase capacity for more freight trains on the existing network.

https://logistics.org.uk/CMSPages/GetFile.aspx?guid=26280145-1894-452e-8f18-7193fc0a5646&lang=en-GB

 

[micheal_can]

Firstly, I am taking everything @crs1026 as true as the current state of freight offering.

That said, at some point we may have to confront the reality of an industry tuned to the convenience of shareholders rather than to maximize the ability to shift freight off the roads. (And by that I don’t mean all freight, just shifting the convenience/cost curves to allow a higher mode shift)

We don’t see MTO permanently reducing 400 series highways to 60km/h so that they can reduce lane widths and thereby paving costs, or closing off-ramps because a vehicle audit showed insufficient use. We don’t see them permitting only certain truck companies to operate over them, or even only Ontario registered ones. The indirect cost recovery from the heaviest vehicles causing the most wear and tear is not sufficient to dissuade more and move movements, driving demands for widenings and bypasses at the expense of the general taxpayer.

But we have rail alignments, which are expensive and difficult to create, allowed to degrade to the point where only the most profitable traffic is worth moving over it, and if that remainder goes discontinuance follows. Meanwhile municipalities grub away at the property taxes they can get from their existence, helping push the colour of the spreadsheets from black to red.

What are we doing?

The only way to stop what you speak of is to either force stronger regulations on them, or nationalize them. Neither is going to happen, so we are stuck with what we have,

 

[crs1026]

What are we doing?

The industry has definitely become a boutique where only shipments that generate superior ROI are allowed.

The industry generates an ROI of about 6% (last time I checked, and I may be a year or two out of date)

A different paradigm that generated a utility grade return of only 3% but hauled a great deal more might well serve the country better..... and still generate enough capital to meet its needs for investment. But try to sell that to the Street, when so many powerful investors have already put their money into railway stock.

The first step would be a more transparent and focussed model for funding highways..... but try selling that idea to provinces like Ontario, where Ford has cut gas taxes to make highway use more "affordable"..... and where highway tolls re a dirty word.

The good news is, our railway system does move large volumes of bulk commodities in a very efficient manner. The issue is, how to reinject that lower ROI traffic to a system that can't digest it.

If a certain somebody gets elected in the US next week, I can see an unravelling of NAFTA in a manner that might undo the current tri national structure of our railways. That might move Canada forwards, but that's a smaller gain in. larger loss.

I'm not optimistic, but intellectually I agree totally with your take on the industry.

- Paul

 

[Bojaxs]

A lot of the freight you see being trucked on the highways is probably intra-provincial hauling.

Unless you're moving goods across the country or to another province, it doesn't make sense to put your freight on a train.

The only province that can move goods/ freight intra-provincially by rail is Alberta. Both CN and CPKC have sizeable container yards in both Edmonton and Calgary. Aside from that every province has only 1 container yard from either CN or CPKC. And typically both CN and CPKC's container yards are fairly close to one another. Nova Scotia only has 1 container yard because only CN serves that province. Soon CN will have a second in Ontario with Milton, which should help to serve Southern Ontario customers. All freight to Ottawa pretty much gets offloaded in the Montreal yard.

CPKC for awhile didn't even move freight east of Montreal. They sold all their tracks heading into the Atlantic region. Then Intermodal took off and they realized that was a mistake. Now they have some complex setup with tracks running through Maine into St. John.

 

[micheal_can]

A lot of the freight you see being trucked on the highways is probably inter-provincial hauling.

Unless you're moving goods across the country or to another province, it doesn't make sense to put your freight on a train.

The only province that can move goods/ freight inter-provincially via rails is Alberta. Both CN and CPKC have sizeable container yards in both Edmonton and Calgary. Aside from that every province has only 1 container yard. Soon CN will have a second in Ontario with Milton, which should help to serve Southern Ontario customers. All freight to Ottawa pretty much gets offloaded in the Montreal yard.

CPKC for awhile didn't even move freight east of Montreal. They sold all their tracks into the Atlantic. Then Intermodal took off and they realized that was a mistake. Now they have some complex setup with tracks running through Maine into St. John.

Well, a good example that should not be truck is Toronto's garbage to Michigan.

The other issue in ON is that the rail yards that offload good are in the GTA, yet the province is over 1000km wide. At least with Montreal, freight on that side of the province can be offloaded within a relatively short distance. I get the push back, but at what point will we collectively fix what we did wrong in the past?

 

[lenaitch]

A lot of the freight you see being trucked on the highways is probably inter-provincial hauling.

Unless you're moving goods across the country or to another province, it doesn't make sense to put your freight on a train.

The only province that can move goods/ freight inter-provincially via rails is Alberta. Both CN and CPKC have sizeable container yards in both Edmonton and Calgary. Aside from that every province has only 1 container yard. Soon CN will have a second in Ontario with Milton, which should help to serve Southern Ontario customers. All freight to Ottawa pretty much gets offloaded in the Montreal yard.

CPKC for awhile didn't even move freight east of Montreal. They sold all their tracks into the Atlantic. Then Intermodal took off and they realized that was a mistake. Now they have some complex setup with tracks running through Maine into St. John.

As well as intra-provincial.

A lot of what you see on the 401is the modern industrial warehousing system.. Just-in-time delivery strings both inputs and outputs onto the highway system. A train load of widget parts stored in a warehouse has been replaced by truckloads of parts delivered at intervals that match the production cycle.

Well, a good example that should not be truck is Toronto's garbage to Michigan.

Toronto hasn't done that in several years; although I understand some other Ontario municipalities still do. Toronto trucks its garbage to Southwold ON. One problem with shipping waste by rail is the presence of a rail line gets added to the complex and contentious landfill siting process. Harris tried to ship it to near Kirkland Lake which died a natural death.

The other issue in ON is that the rail yards that offload good are in the GTA, yet the province is over 1000km wide. At least with Montreal, freight on that side of the province can be offloaded within a relatively short distance. I get the push back, but at what point will we collectively fix what we did wrong in the past?

What does that mean? Quebec is larger in both dimensions than Ontario. The GTA et al area population is greater, but Montreal is a major port - something Toronto is definitely not.

 

[Bojaxs]

Ad well as intra-provincial.

A lot of what you see on the 401is the modern industrial warehousing system.. Just-in-time delivery strings both inputs and outputs onto the highway system. A train load of widget parts stored in a warehouse has been replaced by truckloads of parts delivered at intervals that match the production cycle.

Sorry, I misspoke. I was actually referring to INTRA-provincial as well.

I didn't realise inter-provincial & intra-provincial meant totally different things.

But yes, that's a good example of the trucks you often see in the highways.

 

[micheal_can]

Toronto hasn't done that in several years; although I understand some other Ontario municipalities still do. Toronto trucks its garbage to Southwold ON. One problem with shipping waste by rail is the presence of a rail line gets added to the complex and contentious landfill siting process. Harris tried to ship it to near Kirkland Lake which died a natural death.

My mistake. Mind you, that does explain why the most busy section is between the GTA and London.

That does that mean? Quebec is larger in both dimensions than Ontario. The GTA et al area population is greater, but Montreal is a major port - something Toronto is definitely not.

Take a container and truck it to QC from Montreal. You have 2 highways to choose from. Take a container from one of Toronto's terminals and send it to London. You really only have one.

 

[Metroscapes]

New Keewatin locos (ex Amtrak P40s) are in this video, starting at 4:26.