Railway Age March 2022

MARCH 2022

W W W. R A I LWAYA G E .C O M

AILWAY GE S E R V I N G T H E R A I LWAY I N D U S T R Y S I N C E 1 8 5 6

TOP LINE

Railroad Leadership Identifies What’s Required, and Why

GROWTH

HIGH-PERFORMANCE PASSENGER RAIL

How Much Closer to Reality?

CYBERSECURITY railwayage.com

Let’s Face It: We’re Vulnerable August 2017 // Railway Age 1

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February2022 MARCH 2020

38

FEATURES 10

CEO Perspectives

34

Rail Cybersecurity

38

High-Performance Rail

44 47

What’s Needed for Growth

Face It: We’re Vulnerable

It’s About Much More Than Speed

Timeout for Tech

Third In a Series With Gary Fry

TTCI R&D

Wheel Defect Detection With EMATS

DEPARTMENTS 4 6 8 49 50 50 51

Industry Indicators Industry Outlook Market People Professional Directory

COMMENTARY 2 9 52

From the Editor Watching Washington Financial Edge

Classified Advertising Index

COVER PHOTO

Gary Pancavage

At dusk, a BNSF empty grain train approaches Hauser Junction, Idaho.

Bruce Kelly photo.

Railway Age, USPS 449-130, is published monthly by the Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation, 88 Pine St., 23rd Fl., New York, NY 10005-1809. Tel. (212) 620-7200; FAX (212) 633-1863. Vol. 223, No. 3. Subscriptions: Railway Age is sent without obligation to professionals working in the railroad industry in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. However, the publisher reserves the right to limit the number of copies. Subscriptions should be requested on company letterhead. Subscription pricing to others for Print and/or Digital versions: $100.00 per year/$151.00 for two years in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico; $139.00 per year/$197.00 for two years, foreign. Single Copies: $36.00 per copy in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico/$128.00 foreign All subscriptions payable in advance. COPYRIGHT© 2022 Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reproduced without permission. For reprint information contact PARS International Corp., 102 W. 38th Street, 6th floor, New York, N.Y. 10018, Tel.: 212-221-9595; Fax: 212-221-9195. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY, and additional mailing offices. Canada Post Cust.#7204564; Agreement #41094515. Bleuchip Int’l, PO Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2. Address all subscriptions, change of address forms and correspondence concerning subscriptions to Subscription Dept., Railway Age, PO Box 239 Lincolnshire IL 60069-0239 USA, Or call +1 (402) 346-4740, FAX +1 (847) 291-4816. Printed at Cummings Printing, Hooksett, N.H. ISSN 0033-8826 (print); 2161-511X (digital).

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March 2022 // Railway Age 1

FROM THE EDITOR What’s the Big Deal With Forced Access?

N

ow that I’ve got your attention (I hope?), allow me to offer a few of my own observations, as well as those of others, living and deceased, on what the Surface Transportation Board calls “Reciprocal Switching.” The Association of American Railroads doesn’t care for that term, calling the practice “Forced Access”—kind of like “breaking and entering, legally.” Canadians have a simpler term, one word: “Interswitching,” and it has been in place for a long time.

In layman’s terms, Reciprocal Switching (shall we assign a new acronym here, “RS,” with apologies to motorsports for cribbing “Rallye Sport,” a badge applied to some very fast cars?) means this: “My railroad service stinks to high heaven. Unless it improves, I’m going to pay for another, nearby railroad to run their trains over your tracks to my place and pick up (or deliver) my freight faster and better than you can, or want to. It’s not so bad, because you get paid, too. And if you moan and groan that it’s going to gum up your railroad, I really don’t give a damn, Scarlett. I’m the customer, and your service ain’t cuttin’ it. Take your 15,000-foot trains and shove them in a 10,000-foot siding.”

Fiddle dee dee! Let’s take a look at WWHD? (What Would Hunter Do?).

Here’s what the legendary Mr. Harrison told me a few years ago, when he was running Canadian Pacific: “It’s one of these regs that are in place, but people don’t really take advantage of it, because there’s no need to if the individual carriers do their job. It’s something that

could be called a lever that you have, if it needed to be used. My view is, for years a lot of railroaders had been scared of the term “open access,” and I don’t know why. What that says to me is, all we’re going to do is open up more competition, and with a very limited number of players in North America now, it’s important to keep that competitive balance. And if an individual carrier, CP included, provides the right type of service for the customer, at an appropriate fair price, we have nothing to worry about. If we do not provide the service, we should not be resistant to someone else coming and providing it.”

Capitol Hill Contributing Editor Frank Wilner explains it rather well: “Reciprocal Switching means that in limited circumstances, a shipper served by only one railroad at origin or destination may request its freight cars be switched to or from a second, nearby railroad so as to create price and service competition over the longer line-haul. The second railroad would pay a compensatory switch fee. The Reciprocal Switching remedy would have to be ‘practicable or in the public interest’ and ‘necessary to provide competitive rail service.’ The expectation of a Reciprocal Switching mandate is that with the prospect of two-railroad competition for the line-haul, the railroad holding sole access to the shipper loading or unloading facility would provide a more competitive price and service so as to retain its single-line origin-todestination haul.”

So what’s the big deal? Why all the handwringing and pushback and massive STB legal filings? Do what you say you’re going to do, and you have nothing to worry about. Right?

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Always on Always Innovating CSX leverages state-of-the-art asset health monitoring and maintenance technology to deliver safe and efficient freight transportation services. Our innovative solutions enable us to make real-time decisions that change the game for our customers – moving shipments across our extensive network with greater ease and speed. When reliability that keeps your goods going counts, count on CSX.

Industry Indicators ‘JANUARY 2022 FACED DIFFICULT COMPS IN SEVERAL CATEGORIES’ “January 2022 faced difficult comps in several categories,” the Association of American Railroads reported last month. “For example, carloads of grain were down 14.0% in January 2022, but January 2021 was the best January for grain since 1990. Carloads of grain mill products were down 3.5% over last year, but January 2021 was the best January for them since 2015. Carloads of iron and steel scrap fell 7.7% in January 2022, but January 2021 was the best January for them since 2015 as well. U.S. intermodal volume was 1.00 million units in January 2022, down 14.6% from last year, but January 2021 was the second best month ever for intermodal.”

Railroad employment, Class I linehaul carriers, JANUARY 2022 (% change from JANUARY 2021)

TOTAL EMPLOYEES: 111,754 % CHANGE FROM JANUARY 2021: -1.50%

Transportation (train and engine) 45,767 (+0.54%)

Executives, Officials and Staff Assistants 7,268 (-0.34%)

TRAFFIC ORIGINATED CARLOADS

FOUR WEEKS ENDING JAN. 29, 2022

MAJOR U.S. RAILROADS

BY COMMODITY

JAN. ’21

JAN. ’20

% CHANGE

Grain Farm Products excl. Grain Grain Mill Products Food Products Chemicals Petroleum & Petroleum Products Coal Primary Forest Products Lumber & Wood Products Pulp & Paper Products Metallic Ores Coke Primary Metal Products Iron & Steel Scrap Motor Vehicles & Parts Crushed Stone, Sand & Gravel Nonmetallic Minerals Stone, Clay & Glass Products Waste & Nonferrous Scrap All Other Carloads

94,514 2,887 37,158 24,410 137,373 37,909 256,921 4,432 13,411 21,782 19,466 12,726 34,891 15,854 46,877 64,970 13,427 27,640 13,690 21,927

109,910 3,742 38,503 23,978 136,274 47,418 243,325 4,402 13,541 22,422 23,283 13,601 35,328 17,180 58,436 60,586 12,541 27,736 14,709 23,211

-14.0% -22.8% -3.5% 1.8% 0.8% -20.1% 5.6% 0.7% -1.0% -2.9% -16.4% -6.4% -1.2% -7.7% -19.8% 7.2% 7.1% -0.3% -6.9% -5.5%

902,265

930,126

-3.0%

271,658

329,122

-17.5%

1,173,923

1,259,248

-6.8%

TOTAL U.S. CARLOADS

CANADIAN RAILROADS TOTAL CANADIAN CARLOADS

COMBINED U.S./CANADA RR

Professional and Administrative 9,672 (-5.35%)

Maintenance-of-Way and Structures 27,452 (-0.60%)

Maintenance of Equipment and Stores

Intermodal

FOUR WEEKS ENDING JAN. 29, 2022

MAJOR U.S. RAILROADS

BY COMMODITY

JAN. ’22

Trailers Containers TOTAL UNITS

80,627 920,816

16,940 (-6.33%)

CANADIAN RAILROADS

Transportation (other than train & engine)

Trailers Containers TOTAL UNITS

4,655 (-1.48%)

COMBINED U.S./CANADA RR

Source: Surface Transportation Board

Trailers Containers

TOTAL COMBINED UNITS

JAN. ’21

% CHANGE

91,651

1,224,780

1,081,588 1,334,509

-12.0% -14.9% -14.6%

1 248,445 248,446

0 292,294 292,294

— -15.0% -15.0%

80,628 1,169,261

91,651 1,373,882

-12.0% -14.9%

1,249,889

1,465,533

-14.7%

Source: Rail Time Indicators, Association of American Railroads

4 Railway Age // March 2022

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BEFORE YOU INVEST IN ANOTHER AIR BRAKE CONTROL VALVE,

TOTAL U.S./Canadian CARLOADS, JAN. 2022 VS. JAN. 2021

1,173,923 JANUARY 2022

STOP & CONSIDER:

1,259,248 JANUARY 2021

Short Line And Regional Traffic Index CARLOADS

BY COMMODITY Chemicals Coal Crushed Stone, Sand & Gravel Food & Kindred Products Grain Grain Mill Products Lumber & Wood Products Metallic Ores Metals & Products Motor Vehicles & Equipment Nonmetallic Minerals Petroleum Products Pulp, Paper & Allied Products Stone, Clay & Glass Products Trailers / Containers Waste & Scrap Materials All Other Carloads

ORIGINATED JAN. ’22

ORIGINATED JAN. ’21

% CHANGE

51,600 14,871 18,349 10,988 31,002 8,102 8,593 2,902 16,369 8,206 2,257 2,038 18,828 11,674 39,488 10,558 62,847

51,811 21,205 15,215 10,562 33,623 8,098 8,701 2,068 17,273 9,049 2,077 1,806 19,105 11,838 40,544 10,271 69,012

-0.4% -29.9% 20.6% 4.0% -7.8% 0.0% -1.2% 40.3% -5.2% -9.3% 8.7% 12.8% -1.4% -1.4% -2.6% 2.8% -8.9%

Copyright © 2022 All rights reserved.

TOTAL U.S. Carloads and intermodal units, 2013-2022

(in millions, year-to-date through JANUARY 2022, SIX-WEEK MOVING AVERAGE)

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March 2022 // Railway Age 5

Positives From ‘Railroad Happy Hour’ RAIL DEMAND CONTINUES TO BE STRONG AS OPERATORS LEAN FURTHER INTO PRICING. Leaders from across the railroad and logistics industries provided market insight at Cowen and Company’s February “Suds With Seidl” event. They praised the coordination of CSX, while consensus on Norfolk Southern’s (NS) network and fluidity was decidedly negative, citing a potential loss of business due to performance. Intermodal demand remains robust.

Among the key takeaways: • 2022 has been strong for railroads so far, although not all operators have been executing. A continued robust rate environment has positioned the rails for a strong start to the year, on top of some carload volumes improvements we have seen in recent weeks. That said, numerous panelists shared noteworthy anecdotes regarding the lack of execution and fluidity on NS. One 6 Railway Age // March 2022

panelist highlighted that it is taking NS twice as long to move a box, which will likely cost the railroad business as customers take action on the lack of performance.

On the other coast, Union Pacific (UP) has been a real challenge as well, and recently implemented a massive surcharge: $4K per box beginning March 13 for some customers. One intermodal panelist stated they lost $40K worth of product in one day on the UP due to rail theft, which has been rampant for the company.

• On the terminal and port side, customers continue to do everything they can to get their product where they need it and are not concerned about price. The largest challenge within the ports is that they are dependent on trucking supply, which continues to be severely challenged.

Several panelists complained about high drayage rates. While we are starting to see some slight easing of congestion at the

West Coast ports, it is too early to tell if this is a lagged effect of the Lunar New Year, or if backlog really has improved. We note that dwell times have significantly increased at the Port of Charleston, as it was reported more than 30 vessels were anchored off the coast.

• The effect of the war in Ukraine will have implications across the transportation landscape. One panelist stated that complying with sanctions was a “voyage of interpretation” at the moment. We are already seeing fuel pricing surge amid concerns. Unfortunately, the equipment shortages and congestion are limiting the railroads’ ability to take on much additional freight.

• Demand for both existing and newly manufactured railcars remains strong.

This is a result of elevated scrapping over the last 18 months and solid underlying freight demand. While steel and scrap prices moderated somewhat in recent weeks, the turbulence in Europe could cause them to rise again. North American industry fleet utilization has improved to just above 80%, from a dismal 68% in mid-2020. The panelists noted that many lease fleets are near full utilization, helping to keep the positive rate momentum intact.

Manufacturing lead times are stretching well into 2023.

Primary rail investment risks: • Risk of economic downturns and their impact on rail traffic and pricing.

• Regulatory risk posing a threat to the railroads’ ability to achieve sufficient returns on their investments.

• The possibility of higher-speed passenger rail encroachment.

• Litigation risk stemming from accidents and fatalities.

• Competitive threat posed by other modes of freight transportation, such as trucking.

• High capital spending required to build and maintain railroad networks and to replace cars and locomotives.

• Risk of severe weather disrupting railroad networks.

• Rising fuel costs and the lag effect of fuel surcharge recovery.

– Jason Seidl, Managing Director, Cowen and Company, and Railway Age Wall Street Contributing Editor railwayage.com

William C. Vantuono

Industry Outlook

MARKET Multilevel Cars Arrive at exo

WORLDWIDE

NORTH AMERICA

Australian iron-ore producer FORTESCUE METAL GROUP completed acquisition of WILLIAMS ADVANCED ENGINEERING (WAE) from private equity firm EMK Capital and Williams Grand Prix Engineering for £164 million.

WAE and Fortescue will begin development of an emissions-free “Infinity Train,” a regenerative battery-electric iron-ore train that will use gravitational energy to recharge its battery systems when traveling fully loaded on downhill sections.

MITSUBISHI ELECTRIC CORP., which in 2020 joined THALES and SIEMENS as the NEW YORK METROPOLITAN TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY’S third CBTC (communications-based train control)-certified supplier after completing a testing program launched in 2015, has been awarded a $62.65 million contract to provide wayside equipment for the MTA NEW YORK CITY TRANSIT QBL-E (Queens Boulevard Line East) resignaling project. MTA CONSTRUCTION AND DEVELOPMENT COMPANY (MTA C&D), the MTA subsidiary that will manage the installation, awarded the contract. Mitsubishi Electric “will supply its first CBTC equipment outside of Japan and will become the MTA’s first non-European CBTC supplier,” the company noted. The Mitsubishi-supplied equipment will manage train traffic on the east end of the QBL between the Union Turnpike and Jamaica-179th Street stations. The system is expected to enter commercial operation in 2026. Mitsubishi Electric said it “now aims to expand its supply of signaling systems to other masstransportation operators in the global

8 Railway Age // March 2022

market, primarily those in North America but also selected operators in Asia where the demands for CBTC technology are growing.” (In 2015, the MTA awarded Siemens and Thales two 67-month contracts worth a total of $205.8 million for the QBL West Phase 1 CBTC project.)

With a length of around 27 track-miles, the QBL is the second-longest line on the NYCT rapid transit network. It has 25 stations and stretches from Jamaica Station in the Borough of Queens to Manhattan.

With a daily volume of more than 250,000 passengers (pre-pandemic), it is one of the most heavily used lines on the NYCT network. Prior to receiving the QBL West Phase 1 contract, Siemens successfully installed CBTC on MTA’s Canarsie “L” line that operates from Chelsea (Manhattan), through Williamsburg to Canarsie (Brooklyn). The Canarsie Line has been running in full ATO (automatic train operation) mode since 2009. NYCT’s Flushing/No. 7 Line (including the extension to 34th Street and 11th Avenue) is equipped with a Thales-supplied system. QBL West Phase 1 was the third NYCT line to be equipped with CBTC. railwayage.com

exo

Last month, CRRC delivered the first two of 44 multilevel railcars to exo, Montreal’s regional/commuter rail and bus system.

The agency—officially known as Réseau de Transport Métropolitain, or RTM— placed a 24-car order with CRRC in 2017 and exercised an option for an additional 20 in 2019. Included are eight cab cars and 36 trailer cars. The total order is valued at nearly C$196 million; the government of Québec provided funding through the Programme d’aide gouvernementale au transport collectif des personnes (PAGTCP). The cars accommodate up to 147 seated riders and will run first on the exo2 Saint-Jérôme line.

Watching Washington

Labor Talks: A Headache But Never a Bore

T

he farmer and the cowman should be friends,” wrote Rodgers and Hammerstein for the 1943 musical, Oklahoma! In 1967, Aretha Franklin recorded R-E-S-PE-C-T. Five gets you 10 that neither friendship nor respect exist at the bargaining table where rail management and labor have been negotiating contract amendments since January 2020.

Most Class I railroads and many smaller ones are negotiating with 12 labor unions. Talks now guided by the National Mediation Board (NMB) likely will continue through 2022. Rail labor contracts remain in force until voluntarily or third-party amended.

Blame delay and some unpleasantness on COVID-19, forcing video-conferencing rather than face-to-face bargaining sessions more conducive to building trust.

Core quarrels concern Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR)—an operating plan to do more with less; headcount reductions; worker availability and discipline policies; unpredictable work schedules; the impact on revenue from declining coal traffic; pricing power threatened by regulatory activism at the Surface Transportation Board; and the funneling since 2010 of $183 billion to stockholders through dividends and share buybacks—perceived by labor as lavish profitability rather than reduced incentive to reinvest.

Labor wants a 40% wage increase through July 2025, citing the highest consumer price inflation in four decades.

Rail worker compensation—now averaging $96,000—already tops 94% of the domestic workforce.

Another squabble is healthcare benefit reform. Rail workers enjoy generously low copays and deductibles, make no contribution toward dental and vision care, and pay under $230 monthly for a family plan—just 12% of its costs.

Contributing to sour moods is the carriers’ desire to operate—on Positive Train Control (PTC) equipped routes— engineer-only, where one conductor and one engineer now are required by contract. PTC is a $13 billion, labor railwayage.com

supported, crash-avoidance safety overlay system to eliminate human-factor-caused train accidents.

A 2021 court-ordered arbitration panel ruled minimum crew size be negotiated railroad-by-railroad rather than in national negotiations as preferred by carriers. A promising starting point for either might be a failed 2014 attempt by BNSF, which proposed a higher-paid “master conductor”—redeployed from the locomotive cab to a ground-based position—and income protection to retirement age for adversely affected conductors.

Labor’s hopes for governmentmandated two-person crews are on life support. A coveted Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) two-person crew mandate was withdrawn after the White House Office of Management and Budget deemed it overreach—the FRA later determining “no regulation of train crew staffing is necessary or appropriate for railroad operations to be conducted safely at this time.” The FRA said it had no factual evidence to support a minimum crew-size mandate.

The California Public Utilities Commission found “a second set of eyes provides only minimal safety improvement.” Los Angeles Metrolink found twoperson crews “can have an unintended contrary effect on safety due to potential for distraction.” The National Transportation Safety Board voices no opposition to engineer-only where PTC is operational.

Amtrak and commuter railroads, plus short lines and regionals—and many railroads globally—operate safely with oneperson crews.

Attempts to legislate two-person crews failed even when labor-friendly Democrats controlled the House and Senate. While some states have legislation requiring twoperson crews should carriers force contractual changes, the 1970 Federal Railroad Safety Act requires rail safety laws be uniform nationally, with the Supreme Court saying states lack authority to regulate interstate traffic.

Meanwhile, rivalry exists between the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and

everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

– mike tyson Trainmen (BLET) and the Transportation Division of the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD), representing conductors. In 2001, the BLET unilaterally agreed to engineer-only operations on regional Indiana Rail Road, and has in place, on BNSF, an agreement to boost engineer pay when conductor jobs are abolished.

Notably, if a Class I railroad unilaterally pulls conductors from trains, but continues paying them—despite current contracts requiring two-person crews—binding arbitration will follow, with history recording that negotiated agreements are preferable to third-party determinations. SMART-TD would be wise to negotiate nationwide blanket conductor protection.

Railroad labor/management relations may be headaches galore, but never a bore.

To predict an outcome is to ignore former professional boxer Mike Tyson’s advice: “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”

FRANK N. WILNER Contributing Editor March 2022 // Railway Age 9

CEO PERSPECTIVES

CEO PERSPECTIVES

North America’s freight rail industry is sharply focused on the future as the 21st century enters its third decade. For this special report, the industry’s thought leaders, the chief executives of leading North American railroad companies, have crafted exclusive, insightful essays for Railway Age on growing and sustaining our vibrant industry, which has helped shape our society and is the backbone of transportation. Each has provided an answer to the single-most critical question facing the industry: What must North America’s railroads do to grow and gain market share from competing freight transportation modes?

12 Katie Farmer, BNSF 14 Keith Creel, Canadian Pacific 16 JJ Ruest, CN 18 Jim Foote, CSX 20 Pat Ottensmeyer, Kansas City Southern 22 Alan Shaw, Norfolk Southern 24 Lance Fritz, Union Pacific 26 Peter Gilbertson, Anacostia Rail Holdings 28 Dan Smith, Watco 30 Ian Jefferies, Association of American Railroads

Bruce Kelly

32 Chuck Baker, American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association

10 Railway Age // March 2022

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Thank you, Bill, for your foundational and continued leadership at Greenbrier.

Sustain a Growth Mindset

B

By Katie Farmer, President and CEO, BNSF Railway

NSF was created with growth at the heart of how we operate.

This growth mindset is reflected in everything we do, including our capital investments and continued leveraging of technology advancements. It is also an integral part of who we have been, are now, and will be in the future. As our business is impacted by changes in the consumer and industrial economies and agricultural markets, we remain nimble and agile to handle increases and decreases across the markets we serve.

We are committed to having the capacity, equipment and people that allow us to grow with our customers and say “yes” to new business opportunities. Collaborating with our customers is integral to our success. We work with our customers to have the capacity available in the right place and at the right time. We don’t expect our customers to run their business in a way that fits on our network; we strive to match our service and capabilities with their needs.

Part of capturing growth is having a strong cost structure—getting everything we can out of our assets and driving efficiency across the network. That helps us improve our customers’ service and further enables BNSF to provide 12 Railway Age // March 2022

competitive solutions. Our growth mindset also drives our strategy and positions our network, customer experience, and service product to stay relevant and grow our share in the future.

Since we don’t just focus on growth as an annual objective or for a specific market opportunity, we have grown over time. Using our intermodal business as an example, we’ve seen demand for our intermodal services consistently grow over a long-time horizon, and we have been able to say “yes” because we have been preparing and are ready to provide the service our customers expect. Last year, we moved almost 580,000 more intermodal units vs. just five years ago.

As an industry leader, BNSF is at the forefront of piloting and implementing technologies that allow us to make the shipping process even safer, more reliable and cost-effective for our customers across our network. We have a robust innovation pipeline with initiatives in various development stages, from proof-of-concept exploration to rapid scaling across our operations. In other words, we strive to make it easy to do business with BNSF. When consumers buy something online, they have an expectation for up-to-date

information about when the product is shipping, where it is in the journey and the estimated arrival date. For our customers, it’s the same, except that information is not just for convenience. We know that providing real-time information about their freight is vital to plan their overall supply chains. For BNSF, we believe supply chain management goes beyond our network, and providing our customers with door-to-door visibility of their shipments is key to the mutual success of all parties involved.

To make it easier to communicate realtime shipment data, we offer our customers a suite of Application Programming Interfaces (API). Our APIs allow customers to track their freight from origin to destination, within their internal systems that they use to manage their shipments, ultimately streamlining the communication process between our separate systems by removing manual data entry.

We have also gained greater visibility about our customers’ freight when it’s not on our network and the expectations for when and where the shipment will ultimately end. Having this information allows us to coordinate better the journey of a specific shipment with our customers, allowing them to plan first- and lastmile movements more efficiently and our network, intermodal hubs, and rail equipment to move more fluidly.

Another example of how we have grown over time with our customers is our logistics park strategy, which uses an intermodal hub to anchor nearby distribution centers. This approach helps our intermodal customers substantially lower transportation costs, reduce fuel costs and lower carbon emissions. For our industrial and agricultural customers, we offer logistics centers, multi-customer, multicommodity business parks. BNSF owns the property and invests directly in developing the facility to create rail-served sites in under-served, strategic, and primarily end-user markets.

At BNSF, we are constantly reinventing, changing and adapting, but it’s to our customers’ benefit for us to be reliably consistent in our bias for growth. You can count on BNSF’s core, foundational elements to remain unchanged so that we will be ready to support our customers’ growth. railwayage.com

BNSF

CEO PERSPECTIVES

Supply Chain Market Reach, and Sustainability

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By Keith Creel, President and CEO, Canadian Pacific

have found that growth comes from designing a product that meets customer needs, followed by consistently delivering. This has been a key outcome of our Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) execution. I am convinced that PSR, to be most effective, must grow and evolve as our industry evolves. In the three decades I’ve worked in this business, and even in the five years I’ve served as CEO of this iconic company, much has changed. There are new considerations our industry may not have been as focused on in the past that now draw my attention on a daily basis. I want to go over two of these considerations 14 Railway Age // March 2022

and explore why they’re essential to growing our top line.

The first consideration is market reach in evolving supply chains. In performing the due diligence that came with our efforts to acquire Kansas City Southern (KCS) over the past year, we analyzed the freight markets connecting Mexico to the U.S. Midwest. Every day, an armada of trucks sets out to link auto parts and assembly plants spread across the Midwest and Mexico. These are long hauls that are naturally conducive to rail economics, but because no single railroad connects these regions, manufacturers are forced to rely heavily on trucks.

We believe that a combined CPKC (Canadian Pacific Kansas City) network can convert 64,000 truck shipments to rail shipments that today clog publicly maintained highways and border crossings as they move between Mexico and the Great Lakes region. Canadian Pacific has many routes that provide direct, competitive transportation services, and our proposed combination with KCS will significantly expand our ability to provide seamless links between major freight markets.

The second consideration is sustainability. Railroads feel the effects of climate change directly. Wildfires, floods and other natural disasters can and have shut down our rail lines. This extreme weather, including droughts like we saw in western Canada last year, directly impacts customers’ output.

Our customers tell us they want to do business with companies that are pursuing a low-carbon future. Railroads are, of course, already a more environmentally responsible option than trucks, as evidenced by our fuel economy being four times that of trucks. However, we know we need to do more. What we hear from our customers, our shareholders, our communities and our employees is that we need to work diligently toward a future where we reduce our emissions and do our part to combat climate change.

We must take concrete and measurable steps now to invest in a low-carbon future.

Last year, CP installed a solar farm at our headquarters in Calgary that is expected to generate more power than we consume annually at our head office. We’re also pioneering the development of zero-emissions locomotives that use hydrogen fuel cells to power their traction motors. This groundbreaking project will generate critical industry knowledge and experience that will inform commercialization and future development.

In pursuing our sustainability goals, we are embracing a network-wide innovation mindset. We know that changes like this will take time, but our world-class team of railroaders is taking the challenge seriously and leading the way for others. The tenacity of our CP railroaders has seen us through adversity many times during my tenure, and I look forward to seeing what comes next. railwayage.com

Canadian Pacific

CEO PERSPECTIVES

Railroads Must Lean Into Their Natural Strengths

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By JJ Ruest, President and CEO, CN (ret.)

hile the industry as a whole is very good at moving goods from point A to point B in a single line, there remains enormous doorto-door, port-to-door, point A-to-point B interline freight markets in North America that want to be captured from other more expensive modes of transport.

16 Railway Age // March 2022

Simply put, railroads must lean into their natural strengths, but also be more than rail and not be limited by their own strengths.

As network businesses that carry goods, we often move freight from one end of the continent to another. This gives us tremendous exposure to a wide variety of customers from all sorts of industries. This means we are fortunate to be

able to work directly with beneficiary freight owners and adjust our approach.

Conversely, this also means being decisive about which business segments are best suited for our natural strengths and which ones are not. Not all commodity segments are the same, and no two customers are the same. Being targeted and being precise enable a better outcome.

Being so in tune with markets and customers also requires being nimble and being a constant student of the market and customer focused. One of the best ways to attract a customer away from their current supply chain of choice is to make it fact-based but from their point of view, not by applying a one-sizefits-all formula. Managing costs and being lean is a key to any good business and a natural strength for the railroad, but once that is achieved, growth is the entire ball game.

Scaling and growing is a challenge for every business, from startups to multinational large caps, but railroads have learned that if growth is planned, strategically and methodically, it can power the future of your business. By working with customers to understand their needs and investing into scalable markets and infrastructure for resiliency and capacity, using already existing operations as the foundation, railroads can provide the best total cost service to customers.

Railroads need the talent and ambition that will enable the right investment, the right technologies, and the innovative solutions. The railroaders, our people, are what set great companies apart. Attracting and retaining talent is key. To make matters tougher, railroads compete with an even broader group of companies for talent, since an innovative thinker, an IT expert, an HR specialist or a crisp communicator can come from any industry. Railroads need to make themselves attractive to everyone.

By leaning into their natural strengths, by being more than just a railroad, by investing in infrastructure, and by adopting and adapting new technologies, railroads possess the potential to capture an increasingly bigger slice of the huge supply-chain land transportation freight market of the North American continent. railwayage.com

CN

CEO PERSPECTIVES

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Performance, Sustainability, Innovation: Keys to Growing Market Share

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By Jim Foote, President and CEO, CSX

orth American railroads lost market share to trucks over the past half century because shippers were willing to pay a premium for speed, reliability and customer service.

The answer to how our industry can recapture a portion of the 80% of intercity freight that now moves by truck is to address the shortcomings that gave it away in the first place. We need to be faster, more reliable and easier to do business with.

Railroads have understood this for decades and grappled with how to reverse this trend.

For the first time in the modern era, our industry is poised to fundamentally change the calculus and significantly grow rail’s market share.

Several factors are contributing to the unique opportunity this moment represents, including rail’s environmental advantage and the adoption of new customer service technologies, but let’s start with performance. At CSX, our business model has enabled us to take operating efficiency to a new level. In 18 Railway Age // March 2022

recent years, we set records for reliability while dramatically reducing transit times. And we are moving aggressively to convert truckdominated business from highway to rail.

Granted, pandemic-related workforce challenges and supply chain disruptions have caused service metrics to decline from their 2019 highs, but the fundamentals remain firmly in place, and we’re confident we will soon regain and even surpass our previous performance levels. We have added hundreds of new train crew members, supply chain fluidity is returning, and we have continued to refine our operating plan to reduce car handling and balance the network.

Other railroads are adopting these fundamentals as well, and CSX welcomes the competition. Our industry is recognizing that fighting for a bigger share of a shrinking pie isn’t a winning strategy in the long term. Our future success lies not only in competing with other railroads, but also in competing against the trucking industry to dramatically increase the size of the railroad pie, and scheduled railroading helps us do that.

In addition to continuing to improve transit times and service reliability, a key component of the rail growth strategy is the use of technology to increase our value as a supply chain partner. At CSX, we’ve invested heavily in our ShipCSX customer service platform, and we’re continuing to develop and roll out new tools and capabilities.

These investments are helping customers see deeper into our shipment data so they can manage their operations more efficiently, as well as making it easier for them to look up rates, schedule service, and transact business.

For railroads to maximize supply chain visibility, we need to cooperate more effectively on sharing shipment information and developing the technologies to support it.

Another factor in railroads’ favor is our inherent environmental advantage. Rail is three to four times more fuel efficient than trucks on average and produces 75% fewer greenhouse gas emissions. Ten years ago, that was primarily a useful talking point in public policy discussions. Today, it’s a substantial and growing business advantage.

In our conversations with customers, we’re increasingly asked about sustainability issues in general and how much, specifically, a given customer can reduce its carbon footprint by switching from truck to rail. The level of a company’s sustainability commitment impacts investor behavior as well as business decisions made by supply chain partners. CSX has moved aggressively to increase our environmental advantage over trucks by setting emissions reductions targets, employing fuel-saving technologies to achieve those goals, and developing tools for customers to calculate their emissions avoidance when they choose rail.

The rail industry’s success in fully exploiting these positive trends will require us to be more innovative than we have been in the past. At CSX, we’re developing new products that provide seamless dock-to-dock solutions and integrate value-added services, such as warehousing and product handling.

Improved performance, enhanced customer service, environmental advantages and business innovation—these are the keys to winning market share from the trucking industry, which is where the rail industry’s greatest growth potential lies. The circumstances are aligned to deliver a bright future for rail, and it’s up to us to take full advantage of this moment. railwayage.com

CSX

CEO PERSPECTIVES

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Competing on a Global Scale

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By Pat Ottensmeyer, President and CEO, Kansas City Southern

ailroads have an exceptional opportunity to grow market share, and they can play a prominent role in promoting cross-border trade and investment in North America. To capitalize on these opportunities, rails must continue to improve service quality and consistency, grow capacity, and leverage the industry’s role as the most environmentally friendly mode of surface transportation. Importantly, rails must also actively incorporate safety into all aspects of the transportation ecosystem, which will help them attract and retain top talent with diversity of perspective and experience, sustain growth, and leverage the technology required to compete on a global scale. Kansas City Southern (KCS) is firmly committed to these principles, and we are driving growth through improvements in our service product. Service begets growth.

KCS operates the only single-line network between the U.S. and Mexico. Given our unique cross-border rail footprint, we understand the important role that rail plays in facilitating growth in cross-border trade.

KCS’s role in North American trade is even more critical, given our proposed merger with Canadian Pacific (CP). If approved, this merger would create the first single-line 20 Railway Age // March 2022

U.S.-Mexico-Canada rail network. We expect this combination to enhance competition with all modes of freight transportation, providing new routes for shippers while reducing overall greenhouse gas emissions.

Technology will play a critical role as we look for opportunities to improve rail service, modal conversion and cross-border trade.

Shippers, rails, and all other supply chain participants require real-time data to drive decision support. Rails must work closely with their supply chain partners to improve visibility to freight at every point in the shipment. KCS is investing in this area.

Our regulators and the government can also play an important role in driving truckto-rail conversion and promoting North American trade. Improvements to customs clearance processes and investments in critical port infrastructure help facilitate faster and more reliable rail service. Trilateral cooperation between the U.S., Mexico and Canada is also critical for efficient cross-border trade and creating an environment that is attractive for reshoring and new investment.

For its part, KCS is preparing for current and future growth by investing in new capacity and engaging people at all levels of the organization to improve customer service.

We are making targeted capital investments,

particularly on our cross-border network.

KCS is investing in new sidings on the Rosenberg and Laredo subdivisions in Texas to add capacity and increase velocity. We are making investments in our international bridge to improve throughput and the velocity of crossborder rail shipments, and we are investing in northern Mexico to improve capacity, yard efficiency, and network performance.

The KCS team is also diligently working to improve service and promoting growth through strategic operational initiatives designed to optimize network performance and trip plan compliance. We recently refined elements of our service design plan to better align capacity and assets with our customers’ operations and requirements. We have undertaken focused efforts to improve critical yard operations in Mexico, and we have performed cross-functional “deep dives” into our grain and intermodal networks to improve on-time performance and customer satisfaction.

To further promote supply chain resiliency and cross-border trade, KCS is working with shippers and supply chain partners to develop a cross-border intermodal service.

The Port of Lázaro Cárdenas has potential to be an important relief valve to the congested ports of L.A. and Long Beach, providing our customers with a compelling alternative to access southeastern, midwestern and Canadian markets.

Thanks to the hard work of our KCS team members, recent investments and initiatives have resulted in all-time best network velocity and dwell performance. However, we still have more work to do and additional opportunity for improvement. To better compete with other modes of freight transportation, particularly truck, our service needs to be faster and more reliable, and we need to offer more route options for our customers.

The proposed CP-KCS merger does just that, while delivering significant environmental benefits. Our combination drives reduced overall greenhouse gas emissions through improved operational efficiency and increased truck-to-rail conversions. We can provide faster, more reliable service to our customers, creating a compelling alternative to competing modes of transportation while improving the resiliency of the overall supply chain. Above all, we are embarking on these initiatives with a focus on the safety of our employees, customers and the communities we serve. railwayage.com

Kansas City Southern

CEO PERSPECTIVES

WHEN YOUR BUSINESS RELIES ON RAIL, RELY ON US. TrinityRail® is North America’s leading railcar equipment and services provider. With a comprehensive platform of leasing, manufacturing, maintenance and professional services, you can rely on TrinityRail to fully deliver trusted expertise, innovative solutions and supply chain optimization. Learn more at TrinityRail.com.

A Simple, Powerful Recipe for Growth

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By Alan Shaw, President, Norfolk Southern

he recipe for sustained topline growth in the North American rail industry is simple and powerful: Offer our customers the efficiency and sustainability of rail, with the ease and reliability of truck.

It starts with improving service levels that have suffered from global supply chain disruptions. At Norfolk Southern (NS), we are committed to restoring service as quickly as possible. When we serve our customers well and operate efficiency, we earn the opportunity to grow.

Market forces are working in our favor for highway-to-rail conversions. We saw extraordinary economic growth last year.

Consumer spending is strong, inventoryto-sales levels remain low, and industrial production continues to improve. Onshoring has become a significant trend.

The pandemic also accelerated the consumer shift toward e-commerce, which grew by 14.2% in 2021, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. Consumers now spend approximately one of every five dollars online. A recent report by CBRE

22 Railway Age // March 2022

projected the U.S. will need to construct an additional 330 million square feet of warehouse space for online fulfillment by 2025 simply to keep pace with demand.

These macroeconomic trends play to the strengths of rail. E-commerce is intermodal-intensive. The superior capacity of rail offers a faster means of rebuilding inventory. Many businesses are unwinding just-in-time supply chains, which will bolster rail demand.

Onshoring creates new opportunities for industrial development.

NS is particularly well positioned.

Our robust franchise serves a majority of consumption and manufacturing in the U.S. Led by the best industrial development team in the industry, we have a pipeline of projects that represent potential investment greater than the last 10 years combined.

As businesses move supplies closer to manufacturing and inventories closer to the customer, we are making it even easier for them to find industrial sites with access to rail. Our new NSites portal is a firstof-its-kind search engine that aggregates

information about industrial sites and transload facilities across our 22-state network into an easy-to-use, map-based web application. With roughly 800 industrial sites and 250 rail-to-truck transload facilities searchable on NSites, rail shippers can quickly find options to expand into new markets.

NSites is only one example of a larger imperative: making it easier for our customers to do business with us. Continued investments in technologies that create a B2C customer experience will be essential to our prospects for long-term growth. Industry initiatives such as RailPulse, which aims to accelerate the adoption of telematics to improve customer visibility into their rail shipments, are the kind of forward-thinking investments we need to pursue.

Another important and favorable trend is the broad societal shift toward sustainability. More than 25% of our customers have announced public goals for carbon reduction, and many more have elevated sustainability to a corporate priority.

Shifting their shipping from highway to railway is one of the most powerful tools our customers can use to reduce their carbon footprint—while also reducing highway congestion and reducing wear on the nation’s publicly funded infrastructure. Last year, our customers eliminated 15 million metric tons of carbon emissions by shipping their goods and materials with us. Reducing these “Scope 3” emissions will become even more urgent in the years ahead as our customers achieve success improving the sustainability of their own operations.

At NS, our goal is to be customer-centric and operations-focused in everything we do, driven by talented employees who are leading the way with their dedication in a dynamic landscape, providing innovative logistics solutions to our customers.

Delivering reliable and predictable service with competitive pricing, helping our customers achieve their sustainability goals, and making it easier for our customers to ship by rail will enable us to capitalize on favorable market conditions and the inherent advantages of our franchise. The resulting growth will be good for customers, shareholders, and the communities we are privileged to serve. railwayage.com

Norfolk Southern

CEO PERSPECTIVES

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Solving Customer Problems at the Heart of Innovation

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By Lance Fritz, Chairman, President and CEO, Union Pacific

o grow the top line and gain market share, North American railroads—and all companies for that matter— must recognize and maintain a laser focus on what their customers value most. We’re doing this by exploring every stage of our customers’ journey with us—from onboarding, through nurturing our current customers to growing their business with us.

For Union Pacific (UP), that means providing safe, efficient, reliable service that consistently meets our customers’ requirements. This starts with understanding how our customers measure their success and ensuring our success metrics are in alignment with theirs.

Strong customer success metrics give us greater line-of-sight to how customers are ranking and rating our performance against their other modes of transportation. Over the past several months, we have interviewed customers and re-examined their journey and experiences with 24 Railway Age // March 2022

us to better understand their behavior beyond what they might only articulate in a survey.

To take this further, to ensure a more seamless customer experience through processes and tools, our tech team is shadowing customers to better understand how they interact with our teams and systems.

As we watch their behavior, we can uncover where there may be an easier way to accomplish a task, and we can quickly adjust on the tech side of our business to make it easier to complete a task. Often, we can identify a problem and a solution that the customer didn’t even realize we could fix. That is true value creation.

We’re also creating digital experience metrics for electronic touchpoints, measuring all the processes or clicks that a customer must follow to do business with us. By measuring these, we can prioritize improvements in the areas that make the biggest difference to the customer.

Technology and innovation are at the heart of all of these efforts and will play a

central role in allowing railroads to keep up and eclipse the competition. At UP, our cutting-edge microservices architecture allows us to deliver APIs for seamless customer and supply chain integration.

UP’s daily API volume of 5.7 billion calls has increased by 233% in the past two years and will grow even more as we connect with more customers and partners across our ecosystem.

As part of our ongoing examination of our customer experience, we’ve redesigned our onboarding with automation to reduce time; we’ve integrated systems to eliminate duplicate data entry, and improved interfaces and notifications to increase visibility. For customers, that means less waiting and more visibility to start shipping sooner.

Once on board, we need to make it easier for customers to do business with us by proactively communicating and improving the ways they interact with us.

At UP, our Shipment Management tool is a one-stop-shop that allows customers to look at and manage their shipments. This application serves each of our business lines—Intermodal, Manifest, and Unit Train—and short line partners in a unique way, matching their specific needs.

Solving a customer problem is at the heart of innovation. As in industry, we must build our understanding of the customer at each interaction, and from there, work to make the customer’s job easier.

But in addition to technology, to remain the competitive choice, railroads must continue to lead the transportation industry in ESG efforts and play a role in our nation’s climate solution. Our advantage over trucks is well documented— moving freight by train instead of truck in the U.S. reduces greenhouse gas emissions by up to 75%. The benefit to our customers—and our communities—is obvious.

Last year alone, UP helped customers eliminate 22.9 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions by using rail instead of truck.

The risk of not engaging in ESG is increased costs, loss of business, and ultimately the real threat of reregulation. The advantages of all of us collaboratively developing effective, scalable climate solutions is a better world for our generation and generations to come. railwayage.com

Union Pacific

CEO PERSPECTIVES

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Growing With People

By Peter Gilbertson, President and CEO, Anacostia Rail Holdings, with Eric T. Jakubowski, Chief Commercial Officer

F

or this industry to thrive in the 21st century, the “pivot to growth” needs rapid acceleration, exploitation of the capacity dividend that PSR has yielded, commercial—not just technological—innovation, and new approaches to recruitment and training of employees.

Not since the dawn of deregulation has

26 Railway Age // March 2022

there been more anticipation by shippers and railroads alike. For the past several years, with pressure exacerbated by supply chain disruptions, we are in a period where railroads are under consideration to handle the business of customers who have primarily or solely relied upon trucking.

There are also new firms that are open to considering the railroad value proposition.

This period is ripe with potential for modal-share shift, but will require a robust effort on many fronts to succeed in true growth for this industry.

Growth requires capacity, innovation, f lexibility, and a coordinated approach to re-engage customers. After nearly a decade of PSR implementation, we should indeed have a collective capacity dividend. Efficiency and capacity were certainly PSR’s objectives, and it is within that context that most customers remained patient throughout the disruption. Wall Street, the industry regulators, customers big and small, and every single railroader voiced the same goal: Now is the time for growth.

People are the key, and the way we recruit, support, train and create incentives needs to change. Sustainable growth in business is dependent on trust and relationships; trust that the services promised by the railroad are reliable. Relationships are nurtured through timely exchange of information and the opportunity to develop solutions for consideration.

Relationships are under duress now with the prevailing conditions. Shippers are facing service interruptions, pricing pressure not seen in decades, and uncertainty. They are anxious. Railroads have reduced their touchpoints to streamline decisions. Fewer salespeople and trainmasters with territories that have multiplied in scale, all beg the question: Do we have enough people to pursue the work of securing traffic? While adding more people may be a logical course of action, this is neither sufficient nor easily attainable.

The great resignation may be a passing trend, but it has drained railroads of experience and front-line managers. The demographics indicate this will continue.

We need to replace employees, and this has proven to be very difficult. While many other enterprises confront this reality, railroads have rarely faced this challenge to the magnitude we have in 2022.

That is the real opportunity: To redefine roles in customer-facing positions, to reconsider the need for critical skill sets, and to be intentional about the type of people we need to promote relationships and growth. We need diversity of ideas, perspectives and life experiences. railwayage.com

Anacostia Rail Holdings

CEO PERSPECTIVES

CEO PERSPECTIVES Critically, we need innovation and entrepreneurial skill sets. We need people who thrive on interaction and relationship building. Perhaps the biggest opportunity is to develop a mindset that every single manager must understand the basic prerequisites for success in a transportation service business. We need to reward and encourage well-intentioned risk taking. Artificial lines between operations and marketing are obsolete.

Perhaps no more impactful example is the role of trainmaster. A most difficult job; it is the linchpin of decision-making.

PSR principles teach that pushing authority lower in the organization chart results in timely decisions, more accountability, and less waste of resources. As a career, we have made these positions extremely difficult to fill and equally difficult for the individual to thrive. When they do succeed, it is often at a huge personal sacrifice. I propose that trainmasters should have different training that supports and rewards a growth bias. We

railwayage.com

need the “strategic trainmaster.”

To support growth, trainmasters must understand the cost of operations and the impact of service on their customers, and, just as important, develop the ability to identify an unmet customer need or opportunity. This will take support and recalibration of responsibilities. But isn’t that what a data-driven, efficient railroad provides?

Rather than extending territories to reduce headcount, let’s use this opportunity to broaden the perspective of these front-line railroaders. Teach them to sell, to pursue opportunities and to manage customer service, and reward them for doing so. They must join the local industrial development group, visit the customer at the end of the rusty track, and introduce themselves to the new business under construction on the outskirts.

As we recruit new railroaders, our success will indeed be dependent on allowing a new generation to help redefine how we perform and thrive.

Eric T. Jakubowski

March 2022 // Railway Age 27

Stay Close to Your Customer

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By Dan Smith, CEO, Watco

wise man once told me: “If you want to improve the bottom line, go listen to your team in the field; if you want to grow your top line, go listen to your customer.”

Never in the history of our industry has this statement been more relevant. We face a unique and unmatched competitiveness for talent, so it’s more important than ever we stay close to our team members. Our customers are facing unprecedented disruption to their supply chains, and they are

28 Railway Age // March 2022

looking for help in solving these problems.

Challenge creates opportunity, and if we do our jobs the right way over the next several months, the rail industry has a great opportunity to earn more market share by converting volume from competing modes of transportation. Watco, along with the entire short line industry, is uniquely positioned to help our Class I partners execute this modal shift. We can grow volumes on less dense corridors and hand larger blocks of carload traffic to their world-class, second-to-none,

long-haul freight networks. We can offer customized service plans that benefit our customers and feed more carloads consistently to the best long-haul freight movers in the world: the North American Class I rail network. No one moves freight safer and more efficiently than the rail industry, and provided we meet the service needs of our customers, we can achieve record levels of top line growth.

Success in our endeavor to capture more freight volume is not solely dependent upon our saying “yes” to our customer, but it is still the most important step. We also need to focus on a collaborative effort to minimize regulatory delays in our pursuit of “yes.” Many times, change of ownership and transfer of assets in our industry leads to positive change. A best owner philosophy around these assets incentivizes better service, creative capital investment, and a better product for our customers. We should do all we can to put the right players in the right positions to win the game. And right now, the game is about saying “yes” to our customers.

I am proud that at Watco, we have always worked very hard to capture every single carload we can. Along the way, we have tried to remember that when we create value for our customer, we could be rewarded with more opportunity. Over the past 39 years, these opportunities have not only created value we share with our customers and team members, but also allows us to acquire amazing assets, prompting conversations with new customers about to how do more business with them.

For Watco, growing the top line has always been about two things. First and foremost, it has been about making sure we listen to our customers and work hard to solve their problems. Second, and not any less important, we need to make sure we take care of our team that serves those customers each day. We need to make sure we retain the great team we have already and do our best to find the next generation of men and women who make it happen every day.

I want to believe that we do both of those things very well at Watco, but the only way we will know for sure is if we stay close to our customers and stay engaged with our team in the field. And we need to do it more often now than ever. railwayage.com

Watco

CEO PERSPECTIVES

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March 2022 // Railway Age 29

A Growing Rail Industry Needs Policy Sanity

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By Ian Jefferies, President and CEO, Association of American Railroads

ail transportation remains a focus in Washington—especially relevant for our industry as we navigate continued volatility and work toward continuous growth into the future. Readers of this 30 Railway Age // March 2022

publication understand what growth will entail in a nation where freight demand will grow by 30% over the next 20 years: capturing market share in mileage bands today dominated by trucks, increasing end-to-end visibility and predictability for customers, and

continuing to innovate to improve safety and efficiency. As society and businesses increasingly focus on ESG, the freight rail sector’s emissions profile, as well as its own carbon reduction progress, will also position the companies I represent to spur U.S. growth.

However, a professed preference for rail among policymakers and wellunderstood goals to reduce emissions and bolster supply chains are at times frustratingly inconsistent with the policy agenda of some in charge. To be clear, establishing a regulatory paradigm to encourage freight rail growth in the near and long term requires policy congruity.

Take, for instance, the forced switching proceeding at the U.S. Surface Transportation Board (STB). Spurred by the recommendations of the National Economic Council in a sweeping executive order, the STB could finalize a proposed rule, spurred by large shipper special interests, even though it is six years old and rooted even older. Observers note that widespread forced switching would gum up the network and reduce investment (as a result of reduced revenues and because investors aren’t keen on subsidizing competitors) —clear challenges for the White House Supply Chain Task Force, where the sole focus is maximizing goods movement and network f luidity.

Environmentalists have taken note, too, as groups such as the National Wildlife Federation reinforced a logical point made by scores of Congressional Democrats last year: market intervention that makes rail less competitive will only lead to freight transportation in more carbon intensive modes. This is not promoting competition, it is perverse policymaking at its worst, hence why labor unions, economists, passenger railroads, intermodal shippers and a range of other interested parties also oppose the proposal.

Or, consider that the Federal Railroad Administration—the nation’s rail safety regulator—continues to discourage data-proven Automated Track Inspection (ATI) technologies as it embarks on another minimum crew-size standard devoid of one iota of data to justify it.

Putting aside that ATI in some cases has railwayage.com

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CEO PERSPECTIVES reduced track geometry defects by 90%, the technology also increases supply chain f luidity, a requirement for growth.

The same logic applies to PTC, which most will agree has been a success to date and equally predict will evolve over time to expand capacity—another way for railroads to grow.

And yet despite the lip service given to promoting rail, the industry today faces a Luddite policy environment antithetical to innovation, destined in time to shift at least some freight to trucking competitors racing toward electrification and automation at the encouragement of the very same policymakers. Once more, the left hand in Washington seems to be at odds with the right.

Despite these pitched regulatory fights, there are bright spots coming out of Washington, D.C. Railroads were encouraged by the passage of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, or IIJA, in 2021. While Congress must return to a user fee

model that removes market-distorting highway subsidies over the long term (the legislation included a $118 billion transfer from the general fund to the Highway Trust Fund, totaling out at $275 billion since 2008), the IIJA included a national Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) pilot program, a first-of-its-kind grade separation program, and moneys for multimodal freight projects. Certainly railroads, their customers and the communities in which they operate will reap the rewards of this legislation.

Notably, the five-year surface reauthorization avoided significant truck size and weight increases pursued not by truckers themselves, but by the very same shipping interests seeking forced switching, that would only further undermine the multimodal competitive playing field and exacerbate the underpayment of over-the-road freight shipments. This, as has been well researched over the years, is good news for growth, too. Creating a system whereby trucks

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pay a weight distance fee that captures their full impact will level the playing field and create needed parity.

Additionally, the continued ingenuity of railroads to pursue alternative-fuel locomotives as well as battery-electric power sources will help attract businesses keen on carbon reduction and minimizing impacts on local communities. The industry is pleased with the establishment of several new programs in IIJA and via the appropriations process that create new public-private partnership and R&D opportunities for railroads, all of which will propel railroads to a new era while at the same time supporting customers.

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Four Parallel Paths to Growth

By Chuck Baker, President, American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association

W

hat must North America’s railroads do to grow the top line, and gain market share from competing freight transportation modes? This is a great question, and deserving of relentless focus. Growing volume and market share for freight rail is what short lines are all about!

32 Railway Age // March 2022

Short lines compete with each other, with our Class I partners, and most prominently with trucks and barges every day on every move. It’s fierce out there. Short lines are wellattuned to their relatively small customer bases, and we are committed members of the community—we live and work in the same small towns as our customers.

To grow volume and market share, we are focused on four areas:

1. Continue to live the short line ethos: hustle, fight and scrap for every last carload from every possible customer.

YCSFWSOYA (You Can’t Sell Freight While Sitting On Your Ass), as they say. And you also can’t sell freight without being flexible, creative, friendly and persistent.

2. Make the most of the public investment dollars available for short line projects. While our Class I partners fund essentially all of their investment privately, and short lines fund a large majority of our investment privately, too, there will be a historically large amount of public funding available over the next five years or so, and short lines must make the most of this. Coming from the IIJA bill, there will be somewhere north of $1 billion per year for the CRISI grant program for which short lines are directly eligible, plus record amounts available in INFRA and RAISE, a new mega-projects program, a new grade separation grant program, and an expanded port infrastructure grant program for which land side rail infrastructure is eligible. Plus, RRIF Express is open for business. And that’s just at the federal level. At the state level, close to half of the states at this point have either a state grant program or a state version of the 45G tax credit or both. Now is the time to dream big and go compete for these funds!

Whether it’s 286K upgrades or bridge rehab or new industrial spurs, short lines have no shortage of ways to put these funds to great use.

3. Regulatory balance and moderation are crucial. Safety is first in railroading, and we respect and value what the FRA does, but we are very concerned about the possibility of a major new rule mandating crew-size staffing. There is no legitimate safety case for such a rule, and it would be a step in the wrong direction for flexibility and innovation and for freight rail’s ability to compete successfully into the future.

Similarly, we greatly respect the STB, and in fact some short lines nod their head along with even some of most aggressive rhetoric about asset and staffing reductions and an unhealthy focus on OR, but we urge caution on rulemakings such as reciprocal switching that we suspect would do more harm than good and on potentially unrealistic and unhelpful requirements for short lines, such as uniform FMLM data reporting. railwayage.com

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4. Modal equity in policy is a must. We compete against trucks every day, but while freight rail infrastructure is almost entirely privately funded (the occasional short line CRISI grant not withstanding), by the time the IIJA funding period is over there will have been $270 billion in general taxpayer bailouts of the Highway Trust Fund at the federal level alone since 2008. That weighs the scale heavily toward trucks vs. rail.

For equity and the environment, safety, and the taxpayer, that balance should be brought back to even as soon as possible.

And at the very least, no more truck size and weight increases or exemptions should happen anywhere, at the state or federal level, ever. And even within the rail sector, equity is also important. Passenger rail and freight rail can coexist and both succeed, but it’s crucial that when passenger rail services start or expand over freightowned infrastructure that it comes with the appropriate amount of investments so as to not harm existing and future freight rail service and opportunities.

railwayage.com

March 2022 // Railway Age 33

CYBERSECURITY

LET’S FACE IT:

WE’RE VULNERABLE Cyberattacks are a serious threat that must be faced.

I

n December 2021, the United States Transportation Security Administration deployed a Security Directive that shined a spotlight on rail cybersecurity following a series of cyberattacks around the globe. The TSA regulations took effect Dec. 31, and rail operators across the U.S. are facing looming deadlines. But achieving compliance across the four required TSA mandates isn’t a quick fix, and the regulations spark additional questions: Why is the federal government rapidly getting involved in rail cybersecurity? What kind of cyberattacks are now targeting rail systems and rolling stock, and what’s next? Are the rail cybersecurity measures in place sufficient

34 Railway Age // March 2022

to fend off sophisticated attacks? Are existing rail technology platforms such as PTC and onboard/wayside fault detection and health monitoring capable of supporting cybersecurity measures?

There is no question that the North American rail industry is vulnerable, as evidenced by recent attacks on OmniTRAX, CSX and the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority. There is also no question that, given Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and known activities in cybercrime, and Vladimir Putin’s thuggish obsession with rebuilding the Soviet Union, our industry’s cyberattack protective measures must be ramped up, considerably. Those who prefer to bury their

heads in the sand and pretend that this isn’t a serious problem risk being blown away from the neck down.

“The TSA is going through critical infrastructure this year trying to enshrine some sensible baselines for cybersecurity practices across these industries,” says Josh Lospinoso, CEO and Co-Founder of cybersecurity firm Shift5, which has expanded its military-grade cybersecurity systems to the transportation space. “One of the reasons they’ve had such a focus on rail is because it is such a central fixture on the critical infrastructure of the globe, moving people and goods around. With the increase of cyber physical effects that we’ve seen over railwayage.com

Shutterstock.com/ TierneyMJ

BY WILLIAM C. VANTUONO, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

CYBERSECURITY

the past year with Colonial Pipeline and a variety of other examples, and ransomware generally causing really significant disruptions in people’s lives, we’re seeing rail as one of the first sectors to get some attention from TSA and DHS. These sorts of regulations are a ref lection of just how important the rail industry is to the functioning of modern society. The government wouldn’t be paying attention if it didn’t believe that.”

“Rail is the second of the 16 critical infrastructure sectors that TSA has gotten to,” says transportation technology and regulatory expert Scott Belcher, CEO of the Telecommunications Industry Association. “This applies to all passenger and railwayage.com

transit rail. There’s a corollary directive recommending that all transit operations comply with the same requirements, which are straightforward. It’s that you have cybersecurity professionals available 24 hours a day, seven days a week; that you do a vulnerability assessment and response plan, and that you report incidents within 24 hours. There are some uncertainties around those requirements. But those will get worked out. We realized that, in the past year, not only does the emperor have no clothes, but nobody in the kingdom has any clothes.

We are all vulnerable. We’ve seen massive incidents. In my own practice, we did a transit study a year ago, and it was a

little bit surprising how unprepared and lacking in appreciation for its own cyber vulnerability the industry is. Some 70% of transit respondents said that they hadn’t had a cyberattack in the past year.

That’s off-the-charts crazy, because if you look at any industry assessment that’s been done, we’re getting hit all the time. It’s our job is to manage it—not to prevent it, because it’s going to happen.”

“We’re getting intrusion attempts higher than six digits on a weekly basis,” notes Rafi Khan, Chief Information Security Officer at New Jersey Transit. “Being a critical infrastructure transit system, we are a moving target all the time. These regulations are achievable. They’re very critical in enforcing specific guidelines so that transit systems around the country are safe and secure and the ridership is protected. That’s an operations conversation for me, but it is very much about how we change the way work gets done within a secure environment because of the millions of intrusion attempts that many transit agencies are facing. How do we change, and include cybersecurity awareness and continue to deliver service in innovative ways within those boundaries so that we are protected? This requires cybersecurity leaders to be cognitive in managing business enablement, but yet, set those environments in a secure and guarded way.”

Longtime freight rail industry investor and Class I board member Gil Lamphere, Chairman of MidRail LLC, sees the big picture as “moving data to moving objects, and moving objects means there are human beings involved. The head of M16 Security Training School recently told me, ‘The past has no predictive value of the future because this is all new. What it does tell us though is that these things go creep, creep, creep, creep, creep; this has been creeping for a long time, and then it goes kaboom.’ Obviously, we have a new urgency that goes up to the CEO and board level in terms of fiduciary and governance issues. This is very, very serious. It can happen at any time. We know we’re vulnerable. There March 2022 // Railway Age 35

CYBERSECURITY are a lot of smart people at the Class I’s dealing with it. But time is not safety’s friend. It never has been. Cybersecurity should be an enterprise risk management activity of an executive team and board.

It is a fiduciary responsibility.”

“What has changed is the realization that you have to have the equivalent of military grade software,” says Lospinoso.

“People who are sophisticated in the ‘dark side’ of the vulnerability spectrum know that the bar has been raised. The banks are going to realize this; the insurance companies will see this in terms of Directors & Officers liability insurance.

Corporate boards are going to have to educate themselves that it’s no longer enough for the management to say, ‘I think we’ve got this covered’ or ‘We’re doing everything possible.’ We know now as experts that the bar has been raised, and you’re dealing with people in the dark spectrum. This goes right up to the board because it hits the board on fiduciary and governance issues. Obviously,

that’s the responsibility of the CEO, but it’s a board discussion.”

“There are two cybersecurity frameworks in place for railway operators to plan, analyze and implement effective measures to protect their assets,” explains Marco Berger, Senior Director Solutions and Applications Management at Ribbon Communications. “The recently published CLC/TS 50701 combines data security and railway safety aspects, while the older IEC 62443 focuses on ICS (Industrial Control Systems), i.e. the rail electricity, signaling, level crossing and interlocking systems. True, most of the recently published cyberattacks used ransomware vectors, but a number of attacks that went unreported focused on the strict and highly isolated OT rail network systems.”

Ribbon’s IP Wave, says Berger, “is a comprehensive IP Optical portfolio ideal for next-generation rail networks.

The portfolio meets stringent network capacity, performance, and resiliency

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“We need to think about rail system cybersecurity and other critical functions in terms of IT/OT system modernization,” Berger notes. “Critical safety and security systems connected to the telecom network include the video surveillance systems that provide facial recognition and weapons detection, as well as the signaling and control systems at crossings and telemetry systems for managing speed, acceleration and traffic.

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CYBERSECURITY kiosks and display screens. There is video surveillance to monitor footfall, support facial recognition, assist in weapons detection, and provide information for crowd control. There is Wi-Fi and mobile connectivity in stations and on trains. And, of course, there are the general alarm and warning systems, signaling and control systems, telemetry systems, dispatch systems based on TETRA/Push-To-Talk technology and not least, communications-based train control (CBTC), and supervision and monitoring systems.

“Existing networks are based on TDM, SONET and SDH technologies. These have proven to be robust and reliable, but they are quickly nearing the end of their effective life cycle. Outdated networks are more expensive and difficult to maintain than newer systems and cannot support the latest, most effective cybersecurity systems.

“This is due to the evolution of and migration of large fixed and cellular

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telephony networks to IP and WDMbased technologies, thereby reducing the demand for TDM, SONET and SDH technology and systems components, thereby reducing production and developments in these technologies. Thus, the simple maintenance and operation of these networks become increasingly expensive and difficult.

“One of the downsides of modernization is the increased possibility of cyberattacks. Individual hackers, governments and private organizations are investing many resources in targeting, paralyzing and obstructing critical infrastructure. Utility companies, rail and air systems, energy producers and transporters, and even governments are all in the crosshairs. North America, Poland, Ukraine and the U.K. have all suffered attacks recently, and no doubt others are being planned.

“So, any telecoms infrastructure modernization has to be supported by a risk and vulnerability analysis, before

implementing systems to detect and prevent cyberattacks. This requires a comprehensive multi-layered approach, vision and strategy. For example, state-ofthe-art UTMs (Unified Threat Management), firewalls, encryption systems, layer one segmentation (layer 1), layers 3 to 7, and SCADA-focused network anomaly detection systems for zero-day attack prevention and detection—in other words, protection from attacks using malware to penetrate firewalls and anti-virus systems, among others.”

Shift5’s Lospinoso likens the overall approach to cybersecurity as situational awareness. “There’s a variety of terms for this,” he says. “From our perspective, for every single client we work with, we start with a cybersecurity risk assessment survey and answer, in depth, all the questions that arise. You don’t know where you need to head until you know where you are. Getting that risk assessment survey done is absolutely the best thing to do, as a start.”

March 2022 // Railway Age 37

PASSENGER RAIL FOCUS: HIGH PERFORMANCE

MOVING FORWARD— AT REST RESTRICTED ICTED SPEED S U.S. high-speed rail is a mixed bag, with some projects more likely to succeed than others.

BY DAVID PETER ALAN, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

38 Railway Age // February 2022

railwayage.com

PASSENGER RAIL FOCUS: HIGH PERFORMANCE

A

Gary Pancavage

Amtrak’s new Alstom-built Acela II trainset, seen here testing on the Northeast Corridor, is expected to enter revenue service later this year.

railwayage.com

s the Obama-Biden Administration began in 2009 and 2010, “HighSpeed Rail” (HSR) became a buzz-phrase in transportation circles. The High-Speed Intercity Rail Program began, but quickly went nowhere.

Democrats sponsored it; Republican governors in Ohio, Wisconsin and Florida killed proposed routes in their states.

Only California planned a genuine HSR line, and that project was nearly dead three years ago. Today, it is alive again and making steady progress. So is Brightline in Florida and its subsidiary, Brightline West in Southern California and Nevada, at least as far as Las Vegas. What about the prospect of more fast and frequent service, which seemed possible for a brief moment about 12 years ago? How is the nation faring with efforts to establish highperformance passenger trains?

First, a definition. For the purposes of this article, “high-performance rail” includes passenger rail services that will achieve speeds of 110 mph or higher. This comports with the FRA’s standard for Class 6 track, where that is the top speed.

Of course, it would also include faster trains on higher-tier track: Class 7 for 125 mph or Class 8 for 160 mph. The FRA allows Class 9 track with a speed limit of 200 mph, which meets the international standard for true HSR, as found in Europe, China and Japan. At this writing, there is no such track in the U.S., but a segment of it is under construction in California.

It has been a mixed bag for projects designed to deliver service at those speeds.

There is an ambitious public-sector project in California, two that are being built by a private-sector company in different parts of the country, one that seems to be headed for the end of the line (not in a good sense), and some efforts to speed service on a few Amtrak routes. Every one of them is different, and some are more likely to succeed than others. Still, the prospect of highperformance passenger rail in the U.S. has moved beyond the realm of science fiction, even though it will not catapult the nation to the status of a world-class hotbed for HSR trains, like Japan, China or a number of countries in Europe.

A bit of recent history: When the Obama-Biden Administration was pushing March 2022 // Railway Age 39

PASSENGER RAIL FOCUS: HIGH PERFORMANCE its version of HSR, which was not as fast as the “real thing” running in Europe and Asia today, Joseph C. Szabo was Federal Railroad Administrator. Szabo “knew the railroad.” He had started on train and engine service in Chicago and had worked his way up, through his labor affiliation. The FRA sponsored a number of conferences about the Administration’s conception of HSR. Szabo remarked that it was easier to speed up a run by raising the bottom speed than by raising the top speed. Those of us who were familiar with the railroad knew this, while those who were not familiar with railroad operations probably did not, but it was Washington’s way of letting us know that applicants for grants should be looking toward what we are now calling “high-performance rail” rather than true HSR according to international standards.

Projects in Florida (Orlando to Tampa), Wisconsin (Milwaukee to Madison), and Ohio (Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati and Dayton, the 3C+D) received grants from the FRA, but Republican governors turned them down. Looking back at the projects, while it would have been good to have them added to the nation’s mobility map, it does not appear that they would meet the standard for high-performance rail. The money that would have gone toward them was spent elsewhere instead, but those projects have been proposed again in Amtrak’s Connect US plan for expanding state-supported trains and corridors by 2035, which was introduced in April 2021.

There was one other grant recipient: the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA), a public-sector agency that started building a line with some true HSR mileage, the first in the nation. The project has had difficulties through the years, including three years ago, when the FRA said the project could not be completed by 2022, and “de-obligated” its $929 million grant to CHSRA. In an article on the Railway Age website, Whither (Wither) High-Speed Rail?, which expressed general doubt about the future of HSR in the U.S., I pronounced the project dead. Its circumstances have changed since then, and it is now doing better.

The proposed system would start with a spine between San Francisco and Anaheim, 40 Railway Age // March 2022

through Los Angeles (Phase 1), now slated to open in 2030. Trains will originate in San Francisco at a new station to be called the Salesforce Transit Center. From there, they will proceed along the present Caltrain line on the Peninsula to San José and Gilroy, turn left and go east through the Pacheco Pass to a point in the Central Valley (and near the current San Joaquin line on Amtrak) between Merced and Madera, and then from Madera south to Bakersfield. From there, the line would go to Los Angeles through the Tehachapi Pass and the Antelope Valley, through Burbank, and into Union Station. South of there, the last segment would go to Anaheim.

Construction is well under way in the Central Valley, with the first segment to be

California’s FRA Class 9 (200 mph) track will be the first of its kind in the United States. built between Merced and a point 19 miles north of Bakersfield. When completed, it will be the first piece of Class 9 track in the country, with a top speed of 200 mph.

Plans call for a three-hour running time between San Francisco and Los Angeles when Phase 1 opens for service. Phase 2 calls for two extensions: from Merced to Sacramento on the north end, and a new route on the south end; from Los Angeles east to San Bernardino and then south through Escondido to San Diego.

The CHSRA is pursuing federal and state funding, including cap-and-trade credits.

The FRA gave the CHSRA the money it started to take away three years ago, and the CHSRA is hoping to raise more money to complete Phase 1 and the two Phase 2 extensions. If the line is completed, it will be the first true HSR line in the country, possibly the only one for decades to come.

If the CHSRA runs out of money, the line would not get any closer to Los Angeles

than the existing San Joaquin trains, terminating at Bakersfield and requiring a bus ride to continue to Los Angeles. The cost of the entire project may be as high as $105 billion, but the CHSRA hopes it can all be built for less money. We are living in economically chaotic times, but the CHSRA expects to raise the funds.

A private-sector corporation is moving forward on two fronts to establish service in two places. Brightline, a passenger start-up company, has been running fast conventional trains between Miami and West Palm Beach along the Florida East Coast Railway (FEC) and building an extension to Orlando Airport. Upgrades to the FEC main as far as Cocoa have been completed, and test runs are now taking place to familiarize crews with the railroad north of West Palm Beach. There is also construction in the area near Orlando Airport, with plans to connect to Cocoa with a new railroad built along Florida State Route 528. Brightline is looking to provide a three-hour ride, with a speed limit of 110 mph on the segment between West Palm Beach and Cocoa, and 125 mph from Cocoa until the last few miles near the airport. Plans call for service to start in 2023.

Brightline has plans for further expansion to Tampa and a station on Disney property called Disney Springs, between the two. This writer has suggested here in Railway Age that running some trains that would make additional stops between West Palm Beach and Cocoa, and eventually to Jacksonville for connections to Amtrak trains going north to New York and other Northeastern cities, would bring tourists to the east coast of Florida and increase mobility for people living there.

Brightline’s other initiative is Brightline West, formerly known as DesertXpress and XpressWest before Brightline bought it in 2018. The original plan was to run between a point in the Victor Valley to Las Vegas, a plan that was roundly criticized for lacking a connection to the Los Angeles Basin, a catchment area with millions of residents, many of whom do not have automobiles. Brightline West’s current plans solve that problem with a new segment that would run eastward from a park-andride station in the Victor Valley to Rancho Cucamonga, a stop on the San Bernardino Line operated by Metrolink, the regional/ railwayage.com

PASSENGER RAIL FOCUS: HIGH PERFORMANCE commuter rail system. Service on that line is the most-robust of all Metrolink lines; it would provide a two-seat ride between Las Vegas and Los Angeles Union Station.

The top speed on the segment to Las Vegas would be 180 mph, the average speed would be 115 mph, and the trip would take two hours. With the 75-minute trip on Metrolink, trip time from the City of Angels to the gambling mecca would be 3.5 hours, faster than a trip on the highway. Brightline officials plan to run a train every 45 minutes, and service is slated to begin in 2026, an ambitious schedule for building a new railroad. There are also plans to serve the region north of Los Angeles with a line to Palmdale that would offer connections to California’s high-speed line and Metrolink’s Antelope Valley Line.

While signals appear green for Brightline, both in Florida and for Brightline West, and yellow for the California HSR project, indications are red for Texas Central, a private-sector initiative that plans to build a true HSR line between

Dallas and the intersection of two highways several miles from Houston, using Japanese Series 700 Shinkansen equipment and technology. The issues are land acquisition and the demands of people who live along the potential line, but nowhere near a stop. Brightline was able to beat back a legal challenge from counties along with Florida coast where the trains would run but not stop, but Texas Central will probably not do as well. A lawsuit by a landowner may stop the line in its tracks.

James Frederick Myles, a landowner along the proposed line, objected to the railroad using his property and sued, in a case covered extensively on our website.

The trial court agreed with him, the appellate court reversed and found for Texas Central, and the Texas Supreme Court turned down the case. Then, suddenly, the Court decided to take the case, invited the state to intervene, and has already held oral arguments. Republicans in the area have opposed the project

vigorously, while Democrats in Dallas and Houston support it. All nine of the justices on the Texas Court are Republicans, either elected or appointed by Gov. Greg Abbott. While courts can always come up with a surprise, it appears highly likely at this writing that Texas Central is coming to the end of the line, a casualty of the rough-and-tumble world of Texas politics. To make matters worse for Texas Central, Rep. Jake Ellzey (R-Tex.) opposes the project and has introduced a bill in the House that would prohibit any HSR project from starting construction until it has acquired all the land it needs. It is unclear whether or not the bill would pass, but it could seriously jeopardize HSR, nationwide.

There are some plans for faster trains on some Amtrak lines, but it is unclear when the speed increases will occur. Parts of the line between Chicago and Detroit are being upgraded for 110-mph operation, as are parts of the line between the Windy City and St. Louis. Yet, running times on both

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March 2022 // Railway Age 41

PASSENGER RAIL FOCUS: HIGH PERFORMANCE lines have not decreased substantially in Philadelphia and Harrisburg is rated for decades. It currently takes almost 5.5 hours 110 mph.

Chicago advocate and railroad histoto get from Chicago to either Detroit or St. Louis, although schedules on the latter line rian F.K. Plous raised an issue about the have been trimmed by about 10 minutes lately, for 90-mph operation. Higher speeds will require upgrades to the existing PTC (Positive Train Control) technology.

There are also places on the Northeast Corridor (NEC) where trains run at high-performance speeds. Acela trains can run at 150 mph on portions of the line in Rhode Island, while they can run at 135 mph on the Speedway in central New Jersey and at 125 mph in other areas. Conventional Northeast Regional trains run at 110 mph. There are plans for higher speeds under the proposed NEC Future initiative, an FRA process that issued a Record of Decision (ROD) in 2017, but no measures to increase train definition of “high-performance rail” in speed have been implemented. Today’s terms of providing enhanced mobility Acela trains average 78 mph between New for riders. While speed is a component of York and Washington, D.C. and slower to high-performance, Plous contends that there are others, too: 1safety, frequency of Boston.

The Keystone Corridor between1 7/17/19 1_2pgHorzWrkStTraining2019.qxp_Layout 10:00 AM Page

Moving toward a HSR future requires cultural change, not just faster trains on upgraded lines.

service, reliability, and connectivity with other trains and local transit. Plous told Railway Age that true high-performance rail requires networks, not merely individual rail lines. He offered the Lincoln Service Amtrak line between Chicago and St. Louis as an example of a line where connectivity is weak. He stressed that a truly high-performance rail network is one that saturates the market by getting motorists off the highways.

Improving passenger rail performance enough to entice motorists out of their automobiles and onto the train would also improve mobility for non-motorists. The issue that Plous raises deserves serious thought, as elected officials, transportation officials, managers and rider-advocates prepare for a future that we hope will have more and better rail passenger service than the nation has today. Moving toward such a future would require more than merely planning and implementing faster service on selected rail lines. It would require cultural change.

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Railway Track & Structures

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TIMEOUT FOR TECH

Figure 4A: Ultrasonic testing equipment customized for rail inspection.

Courtesy of Herzog.

ULTRASONIC

TESTING OF STEEL Seeing invisible defects using inaudible sounds.

W

BY GARY T. FRY, PH.D., P.E., VICE PRESIDENT, FRY TECHNICAL SERVICES, INC.

elcome to “Timeout for Tech with Gary T. Fry, Ph.D., P.E.” Each month, we examine a technology topic that professionals in the railway industry have asked to learn more about.

This month, our topic is fatigue defect detection in steel.

Fatigue defects are a common cause of failure of steel components that resist dynamic loads. For this reason, fitness for service assessments of such components nearly always include specific inspections that are designed to detect the presence of fatigue defects. Unfortunately, detecting the defects can be quite difficult. This is primarily because fatigue cracks are usually exceptionally thin, having measurable length and width but negligible thickness.

As a result, even when a large fatigue defect extends from the surface of a component, it might be apparent only as a very thin, faint line that is not easily seen with the unaided eye—very easily missed.

Sometimes fatigue defects do not extend to the surface of the component, remaining 44 Railway Age // March 2022

completely encased within. Such defects are termed internal defects or subsurface defects and are essentially invisible. This is common with fatigue defects in railway wheel rims and rail heads. For example, Figure 1 (right) illustrates a typical transverse fatigue defect in a rail head. The defect is tinted in green and is located near, but a bit below, the top surface of the rail. The important question is this: How can such defects be detected? One way to do this is with acoustic wave energy.

Figure 2 (p. 45) is a photograph of a gondola floating through a Venetian canal on a quiet summer afternoon. As the boat glides along, the bow of the boat and the gondolier’s oar generate small waves. If we look closely at the magenta square inset in the photograph, we can see that some of those waves are reflected back into the canal after encountering the wall of a building.

Wave motion is the underlying principle of technology that allows us to create images of internal body structures in medical examinations and to “see” invisible fatigue defects inside solid steel. It is also how some animals, in complete darkness,

can locate and capture food while avoiding obstacles, competitors and predators. The technology is called ultrasound, ultrasonic non-destructive testing (NDT), ultrasonic testing (UT) or echolocation.

As the name implies, ultrasonic testing involves high-frequency sound energy.

Specifically, ultrasonic means beyond human hearing. The frequencies used in ultrasonic inspection are usually in a range

Figure 1: Schematic illustration of a rail head fatigue crack. Commonly, cracks in rail heads and wheel rims are completely contained and invisible. railwayage.com

TIMEOUT FOR TECH

Figure 3. Technician using ultrasonic testing to inspect bolts on a combustion turbine.

Figure 2. Water waves reflected by a wall in a Venetian canal. Courtesy of Gary T. Fry. railwayage.com

centered around 5 million Hertz. This is true for medical applications as well as inspection of steel. For comparison, the highest frequency sound detectable by a sensitive human ear is roughly 20,000 Hertz.

There are four terms to define that will help us understand the basic features of ultrasonic testing. To do this, we will again refer to Figure 2. The gondola is a wave generator. The water in the canal is the wave propagation medium. The building walls are wave reflectors. And you, the reader examining the photograph, might be viewed as the wave detector. Those are the four basic terms to keep in mind—all to do with waves: generation, propagation, reflection and detection.

With these basic terms in place, we can describe how ultrasonic testing works.

Waves of high-frequency sound energy are generated and introduced to a propagation medium. If the propagating waves encounter an obstacle—a discontinuity in the propagation medium such as a fatigue defect—reflective waves are created. When reflected waves are detected, that is a direct indication of the presence of a discontinuity within the propagation medium.

For example, the echolocation capabilities of animals such as bats and dolphins might be considered a form of ultrasonic testing. The animals generate clicks at frequencies around 100,000 Hertz—that is, waves of ultrasonic sound energy. For bats, the propagation medium is air; for dolphins, it’s water. They are then able to detect reflected waves and visualize the objects that caused the reflections—apparently quite accurately, since bats can detect and capture mosquitoes this way.

In our example, the propagation medium is a steel rail that might have an internal fatigue defect. As the waves propagate in the steel, if a defect is present, it will act as a reflector sending reflected waves in a new direction compared with the original waves. At a basic level, the waves reflected from the defect can be detected and used simply to indicate the presence of the defect.

In full-featured applications, the reflected waves can also be used to create refined, three-dimensional visual images of the defect and quantify its location, size, shape and orientation. Perhaps as ultrasonic testing’s most refined example, scanning acoustic microscopy (SAM) can be used to create March 2022 // Railway Age 45

TIMEOUT FOR TECH

Figure 4B: Technician interpreting ultrasonic inspection data. Courtesy of Herzog.

three-dimensional images of very small objects and the defects that they contain.

Ultrasonic testing has widespread application in fitness for service assessments of engineered systems. Figure 3 (p. 45) is a photograph of a technician using phased array ultrasonic testing to inspect the threads of long bolts that secure a combustion turbine. As seen in the photograph, the technician only needs access to one end of each bolt to perform the complete inspection.

Figures 4A (p. 44) and 4B (above) are photographs of ultrasonic testing technology customized for the inspection of rail: A) equipment (Herzog Series 7000 Duramax) mounted for in-motion inspection of rail; B) a technician interpreting data on a display.

Fatigue defects can be very difficult to detect, especially when they are completely internal to a component. Today, owners have access to ultrasonic testing technology to nondestructively inspect their critical components and systems. In railway applications, rails are inspected routinely using ultrasonic testing. In this way, fatigue defects internal to the rail head can be detected and removed.

Wheel rims are subjected to similar dynamic contact loads as rails and also develop internal fatigue defects. Ultrasonic testing can be used effectively to detect those defects in wheels.

Ultrasonic testing allows us to create images of invisible defects using inaudible sound energy. It is a technology truly inspired by Nature.

Gary T. Fry

Dr. Gary Fry is Vice President of Fry Technical Services, Inc. He has 30 years of experience in research and consulting on the fatigue and fracture behavior of structural metals and weldments. His research results have been incorporated into international codes of practice used in the design of structural components and systems, including structural welds, railway and highway bridges, and high-rise commercial buildings in seismic risk zones. He has extensive experience performing in situ testing of railway bridges under live loading of trains, including high-speed passenger trains and heavy-axleload freight trains. His research, publications and consulting have advanced the state of the art in structural health monitoring and structural impairment detection.

From the 1st self-propelled rail car in North America to today, Holland has revolutionized flash-butt welding for railways around the world. hollandco.com #HollandLP 46 Railway Age // March 2022

railwayage.com

TTCI R&D Figure 1. Comparison of EMAT principle with conventional piezoelectric-based UT principle.

WHEEL DEFECT DETECTION USING EMATS

TTCI

S

BY ANISH POUDEL, PH.D, PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR II (NDE), TRANSPORTATION TECHNOLOGY CENTER, INC.

ince 2020, Transportation Technology Center, Inc. (TTCI) has been conducting tests to evaluate the capability of electromagnetic acoustic transducer (EMAT) nondestructive evaluation (NDE) technology to detect internal defects in railroad wheels. Preliminary tests, sponsored by the Association of American Railroads, were conducted in a laboratory setting using an off-the-shelf EMAT sensor. The sensor demonstrated excellent detection capability with a good signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) for the wheel samples with internal defects.

railwayage.com

An EMAT is an ultrasonic technique that generates sound using electromagnetic induction. Because the ultrasound is generated directly within the material adjacent to the transducer, this technique does not require any couplant to perform the inspection.

EMAT ultrasound generation is based on the interaction between the magnetic field created by a magnet and the eddy currents induced in the test piece by a coil circuit. Together, the magnetic field and the currents create a Lorentz force or magnetostriction within the material, causing the vibration of the material’s lattice, and thereby generating ultrasonic

waves. Figure 1 (above) shows the comparison of the EMAT principle with the conventional piezoelectric-based ultrasonic testing (UT) principle. Depending on the sensor’s design, the wave type and wavelength can be varied.

The same or a similar sensor receives a return signal and provides a very precise measurement of the surface acoustic wave velocity in the test piece.

Two cut-out pieces from Class C wheel rims (17 inches long and 3.25 to 4.0 inches thick) were considered for proof-of-concept testing.

Each wheel sample contained internal subsurface fatigue cracks. TTCI determined the March 2022 // Railway Age 47

TTCI R&D locations and sizes of the internal defects using a conventional UT NDE method, but did not mark the wheels or reveal the defect locations prior to using the EMAT. A single-channel, off-the-shelf EMAT sensor was used for the feasibility demonstration. This EMAT sensor was operated in normal beam shear horizontal (SH) wave mode at a center frequency of 1,500 kHz. This configuration proved to be sufficient to penetrate the steel wheel material. Since the velocity of shear waves is approximately half that of longitudinal waves, the wavelength of this transducer is similar to a 3 MHz longitudinal wave piezoelectric-based ultrasonic transducer. For future test systems, the EMAT sensor design would need to be optimized for enhanced performance and optimal coverage.

Amplitude vs. time/distance plots, or A-scans, were captured at various points in the wheel samples to demonstrate the signal quality. An ultrasonic calibration was conducted at 80% of the full screen height (FSH). The 4:1 SNR corresponded to 20% FSH of the recorded ultrasonic signals. The backwall reflection occurred at a depth of

1.7 inches and had an ultrasonic reflection/strength of about 6% FSH. The noise level in the A-scan was approximately 3% to 5% FSH. Strong reflections (60% to 100% FSH) were observed at the spots containing subsurface fatigue cracks, but the depths of reflection varied slightly in all defective locations.

For an in-track wheel inspection system, the pulser and sensor configurations will need be optimized to reduce the effect of the blind zone (for EMAT sensors, a typical blind zone is between 2 and 4 µs or 0.128- to 0.256-inch deep from the surface), and depth estimation algorithms (based on reverberations) could be used to provide accurate depth measurements for defects found within the blind zone. However, defects that are greater than 0.12- to 0.16-inch deep can be seen by subsequent reverberations of the signal in the EMAT approach. These reverberations are caused by the sound bouncing back and forth between the defect and the surface of the material. The standard approach for measuring the actual depth

of the shallow defects in the blind zone for the EMAT is to use special algorithms to measure the distance of the peak-to-peak amplitude on these reverberations.

These initial test results were promising and demonstrated the capability of the EMAT technology to detect internal wheel defects (subsurface fatigue cracks). Based on this assessment, it can be concluded that the EMAT technology can be adapted for complete wheel inspections with a sensor array to cover the complete width of the wheel tread and the wheel circumference in order to perform in-line high speed inspections without the need for couplant handling and delivery systems, as required for piezoelectric-based ultrasonic inspection systems.

However, the effect of instrument lift-off (sensor-to-wheel tread distance) must also be understood. TTCI is currently working with the EMAT supplier to help facilitate the development of this technology using array EMAT sensors for in-motion inspection.

The results from this work will be reported in future publications.

RAIL NEWS DELIVERED TO YOU AT HIGH SPEED RAIL GROUP NEWS brings you a daily round-up of news stories from Railway Age, RT&S, and IRJ. This email newsletter offers North American and global news and analysis of the freight and passenger markets. From developments in rail technology, operations, and strategic planning to legislative issues and engineering news, we’ve got you covered.

RAIL From Railway Age, RT&S and IRJ GROUP https://railwayage.com/newsletters NEWS 1 48 RA_RailGroupNews_Half_HighSpeed_2022.indd Railway Age // March 2022

ROUND-UP of NEW

RAILWAY

1/10/22 12:50 PM railwayage.com

People BETH WHITED UNION PACIFIC

HIGH PROFILE: Beth Whited has been appointed

Executive Vice President Sustainability and Strategy at Union Pacific (UP). She has served the company since 1987. Whited, one of Railway Age’s 2021 Women in Rail honorees, will help develop and implement UP’s strategic vision, oversee its sustainability initiatives, and continue leading the human resources organization. She took on her previous position, Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resource Officer, in 2018. She has been responsible for human resources and labor relations functions, as well as employee engagement culture initiatives.

Whited began her first executive role at the railroad more than 20 years ago, serving as the head of Investor Relations, followed by the Marketing and Sales business units. She was also President of UP’s National Customer Service Center and President of former subsidiary Union Pacific Distribution Services. Additionally, she was a founding member and former President of UP’s LEAD (Lead, Educate, Achieve, Develop) women’s initiative. “Beth’s vast railroad experience makes her the perfect person to lead Union Pacific in these critical areas,” UP Chairman, President and CEO Lance Fritz said. “Under her leadership, Union Pacific set its science-based targets, and launched award-winning DE&I programs and employee benefits. She’ll now be a critical partner for me in our strategy discussions, decisions and implementations.”

PAUL TITTERTON GATX

HIGH PROFILE: GATX Corp. elevated Paul F. Tit-

terton to President of Rail North America, effective April 22, succeeding Robert C. Lyons. Lyons is assuming the CEO role following Brian A. Kenney’s retirement as President and CEO, effective April 22. Titterton, currently Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Rail North America, will also be appointed an Executive Vice President of GATX on his transition date. He joined the company in 1997, and has held a variety of positions of increasing responsibility since, including Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer, Rail North America; Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer; Vice President and Group Executive, Fleet Management, Marketing and Government Affairs; and Vice President and Executive Director, Fleet Management.

“Paul has been an integral part of our North American rail business for 25 years,” Lyons said. “His breadth of experience, including senior roles in our commercial and operation functions, makes him the ideal candidate to assume leadership of Rail North America. Paul has a deep understanding of our industry and the customers we serve, complemented by an unparalleled passion for our business.”

“I am honored to lead this outstanding organization,” Titterton said. “I look forward to working with our dedicated employees to continue growing our business.”

railwayage.com

U

nion Pacific (UP) Track Supervisor Lakish “LV” Vanzant of Chicago has earned the Class I railroad’s 2021 J.C. Kenefick Safety Award. The annual award was presented at UP’s Feb. 24 Leadership Conference in Omaha, Neb. Named after former UP CEO John C. Kenefick and established in 1986, the award is the railroad’s highest safety honor given to an agreement employee. Vanzant’s roles in training, field-testing curriculum and work-rule compliance initiatives were recognized. “I appreciate the acceptance of the award, but the homework is not done,” said Vanzant, the second engineering employee to receive it. “I am just getting started.”

At Metrolink, Don Filippi has assumed the role of Chief Operations Officer, following interim service since February 2021.

Arnold Hackett has been appointed Chief Financial Officer. Paul Hubler has been named Chief Strategy Officer. Filippi has nearly 27 years of freight and passenger rail experience. Before assuming the interim COO role, he was overseeing Metrolink’s safety, security and compliance program.

Filippi joined Metrolink in 2018 from the North County Transit District (NCTD), where he was COO and Chief Safety Officer.

He also served for five years at the California Public Utilities Commission, rising to the position of Superintendent, Rail Transit Safety Section, and for 14 years at UP, where he rose from Switchman to Locomotive Engineer to Manager of Operating Practices. Hackett joined Metrolink as a Technology Consultant in May 2019, and subsequently held several interim executive roles, including Chief Financial Officer from March 2020 through May 2021; in May 2021, he was selected by the Metrolink Board as interim CEO following the departure of Stephanie Wiggins. He spent more than 30 years in the private sector at Xerox Corporation. Hubler joined Metrolink on Feb. 28 as Chief Strategy Officer, providing executive oversight and leadership for planning, government and community relations, sustainability initiatives, and railroad services. He has more than 25 years of experience in transportation policy and legislative and public affairs, most recently as Director of Government and Community Relations for the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments.

March 2022 // Railway Age 49

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The Advertisers Index is an editorial feature maintained for the convenience of readers. It is not part of the advertiser contract and Railway Age assumes no responsibility for the correctness.

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AILWAY GE March 2022 // Railway Age 51

Financial Edge

You Can’t Make This Stuff Up

O

ccasionally when the world is in chaos, someone steps up to remind everyone to try not to take themselves too seriously and remember what really matters.

The oldest regulatory agency in the state of Texas is the Railroad Commission of Texas (RCT), founded in 1891. Fortunately, (and you’ll see why below) the RCT has no governing authority over railroads and railroad activity. Unfortunately, it does have jurisdiction over other incredibly important matters such as the oil and natural gas industry and enforcement responsibilities for the Safe Drinking Water Act. There are three commissioners; one is elected every two years.

The RCT is the modern definition of a “clown college.”* Here’s why: In 2022, the Chairman, Wayne Christian (a Grammy-nominated former gospel singer) is up for reelection. Christian is under investigation for corruption after receiving a $100,000 campaign donation from a party who received a permit for an oil field waste dump. Christian approved the permit against the recommendation of the RCT staff. Go figure.

Who is on the ballot against Christian?

There is Marvin “Sarge” Summers, who died earlier this month on the campaign trail after crashing into a tanker truck in Midland but is still on the ballot. There is also Dawayne Tipton, a former oil field roughneck who has worked various oilsector jobs including offshore drilling.

But the real star of the ballot is 37-yearold oil and gas attorney Sarah Stogner.

Stogner (whose TikTok is @theunicornlawyer) released a not-safe-for-work TikTok video of herself, scantily clad, riding a pumpjack as a campaign stunt with the tag line: “They said I needed money. I told them I had other assets.” She’s pictured (above, right); the photo is from her campaign website. We chose (wisely) not to publish anything from her TikTok video. Google it if you’re that curious.

To the people of the Great State of Texas, well, all we can really say is that we are very, very sorry that so much power over systems that impact people’s daily lives are (or will be) in the hands of what New Jerseyans

52 Railway Age // March 2022

call “knuckleheads.” Suddenly, the Texas weather-related power debacle of 2021 makes a whole lot more sense. As they say, you can’t make this stuff up.

One real takeaway underneath the steamy, salacious and trashy (three words strung together you thought you’d never see in Financial Edge) veneer is that the RCT needs a name change. More important, the RCT needs to be more accountable to its citizens, agencies and stakeholders.

What the RCT debacle shows is that the power and success of regulation is always dependent on the people, ideas and agenda of the regulator. What is necessary in North American rail is not more regulation. What is needed for railroads and consumers of rail service (and other core services for states like Texas) is better regulation and better regulators. Depending on the North American rail issue that hits the news wire on any given day—systemic service delays resulting from supply chain backlogs on the coasts; NIMBY mayors in suburban Illinois banding together to oppose the Canadian Pacific-Kansas City Southern merger; concerns about rail loadings growth and a traffic shift to trucks—someone might think more regulation is the proper answer.

Not being exposed to electoral publicity stunts is an especially good thing for an industry (yes, North American rail) working on redefining its image for the next generation. But instead of giving thanks, ask yourself: What is the message North American rail is laying out for the next decade?

View the regulatory picture through that

prism. Is it one of infighting and squabbling from an industry that has enjoyed anti-trust exemption for the better part of the past 100 years (a lesson learned apparently from the leadership of Major League Baseball)? Is it of a dirty industry unable to evolve to address growing concerns about greenhouse gas emissions? Is it of an industry that defines the prefix “un”—uncollaborative, unadaptive, unfazed, you get the point. If rail cannot define itself as a leader, then maybe we should be looking for the next pumpjack. Either that, or expect the regulatory politburo to continue to take shots at our industry.

The 2022 Rail Equipment Finance Conference is being held March 6-9, 2022 (www.railequipmentfinance.com).

Next month’s Financial Edge will summarize the findings from the conference and highlight key takeaways. Railway Age’s Bill Vantuono will be on site at REF to highlight important findings from the conference. 80 degrees and sunny? Check! More than 320 attendees? Check! An agenda jam-packed with rail industry insiders discussing what they see happening in 2022? Check! See you in California.

Got questions? Set them free at dnahass@ railfin.com.

DAVID NAHASS President Railroad Financial Corp. railwayage.com

We’re current, are you? FRA Regulations Mechanical Department Regulations

Now Include Part 22 s 4

A combined reprint of the Federal Regulations that apply specifically to the Mechanical Department. Spiral bound.

Part Title 210 Railroad Noise Emission Compliance Regulations Updated 4-15-19.

215 Freight Car Safety Standards Updated 5-3-21.

216 Emergency Order Procedures: Railroad Track, Locomotive and Equipment Updated 5-3-21.

217 Railroad Operating Rules Updated 5-3-21.

218 Railroad Operating Practices - Blue Flag Rule Updated 5-3-21.

221 Rear End Marking Device-passenger, commuter/freight trains Updated 5-3-21.

223 Safety Glazing Standards Updated 5-3-21.

224 Reflectorization of Rail Freight Rolling Stock Updated 5-3-21.

225 Railroad Accidents/Incidents Updated 5-3-21.

229 Locomotive Safety Standards Updated 5-3-21.

231 Safety Appliance Standards Updated 5-3-21.

232 Brake System Safety Standards Updated 5-3-21.

$34.50

Mech. Dept. Regs.

BKMFR

FRA News: 49 CFR Part 219. As mandated by the Substance UseDisorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment for Patients and Communities Act (SUPPORT Act or Act), FRA is expanding the scope of its alcohol and drug regulation to cover mechanical employees. This rule clarifies who FRA considers a mechanical employee for regulatory purposes, and adopts proposed technical amendments.

DATES: This final rule was effective March 26, 2022.

Part 215: Freight Car Safety Standards 49 CFR 215. Prescribes the minimum safety standards for freight cars allowed by the FRA. Includes safety standards for freight car components, car bodies, draft system, restricted equipment and stenciling. Softcover, spiral.

Updated 5-3-21

BKFSS

$9.50

Freight Car Safety Standards Order 50 or more and pay only $8.50 each

Order 25 or more and pay only $31.00 each

Part 229: Locomotive Safety Standards

Current FRA Regulations Item Code

FRA Part #

209 211 BKTSSAF 213 BKTSSG 213 BKWRK 214 BKFSS 215 BKROR 217 218 BKRRC 220 BKHORN 222 BKHS 228 BKLSS 229 BKSLI 230 BKSAS 231 BKBRIDGE 237 BKLER 240 BKSEP

Update effective

5-3-21 3-1-21 5-3-21 10-7-20 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21 5-3-21

BKCONDC 242 5-3-21

BKBSS

Each

RR Safety Enforcement Procedures & Rules of Practice Track Safety Standards (Subpart A-F) Track Safety Standards (Subpart G) RR Workplace Safety RR Freight Car Safety Standards RR Operating Rules and Practices RR Communications Use of Locomotive Horns Hours of Service Locomotive Safety Standards Steam Locomotive Inspection RR Safety Appliance Standards Bridge Safety Standards Qualification and Certification of Locomotive Engineers Conductor Certification

232 12-11-20 Brake System Safety Standards

32.00

28.80

11.95 11.00 11.50 9.50 11.50

10.75 9.90 10.35 8.50 10.35

7.75 15.75 13.50 13.50 27.95 11.50 8.95 14.95

6.95 14.15 12.15 12.15 25.15 10.35 8.00 13.45

13.50

12.15

Each

25 or more

17.50

15.75

Combined FRA Regulations FRA Part #

Update effective

Each

25 or more

BKCAD

40 219

4-23-19 Drug and Alcohol Regulations in 3-4-22 the Workplace

39.95

35.95

BKSTC

233 234 235 236 238 239

5-3-21 Signal and Train Control Systems 5-3-21 5-3-21 8-26-21 5-3-21 Passenger Safety Standards 5-3-21

22.95

20.65

26.95

24.25

BKPSS

Compliance Manuals BKINFRA18 BKTM

Track and Rail and Infrastructure Integrity Compliance Manual - Volume II, Track Safety Standards - Part 213 Technical Manual for Signal and Train Control Rules. - Includes Part 233, 234, 235, 236

39.95 51.95

The Locomotive Safety Standards cover the laws governing inspections and tests, brake system, draft system, suspension, electrical, cabs and cab equipment plus more!

Softcover. Spiral bound. Updated 5-3-21

50 or more

35.95 46.76

Updates from the Federal Register may be supplied in supplement form.

BKLSS

Locomotive Safety Standards

$13.50

Order 50 or more and pay only $12.15 each

Part 231: Railroad Safety Appliance Standards 49 CFR 231. General requirements for safety appliances including: handbrakes, brake step, running boards, sill steps, ladders, end ladder clearance, roof handholds, side handholds, horizontal end handholds, vertical end handholds, and uncoupling levers. 106 pages. Softcover. Updated 5-3-21

BKSAS

Railroad Safety Appliance

$11.50

Order 50 or more and pay only $10.35 each

Railroad Operating Rules & Practices 49 CFR 217 to 218. Part 217: Purpose, Application, Definitions, Penalty, Operating Rules, Program of Operation Tests and Inspections; Program of Instruction on Operating Rules, Information Collection. Part 218: General Blue Signal Collection of Workers Protection of Trains and Locomotives, Prohibition against tampering with safety services, Protection of occupied camp cars. Softcover.

Spiral bound. Updated 5-3-21

BKROR

Railroad Operating Rules & Practices

$11.50

Order 50 or more and pay only $10.35 each

800-228-9670 www.transalert.com

The Railway Educational Bureau 1809 Capitol Ave., Omaha NE, 68102 I (800) 228-9670 I (402) 346-4300 www.RailwayEducationalBureau.com Add Shipping & Handling if your merchandise subtotal is: U.S.A. CAN U.S.A. CAN Orders over UP TO $10.00 $4.75 $9.20 25.01 - 50.00 12.00 20.05 $75, call for shipping 10.01 - 25.00 8.80 15.35 50.01 - 75.00 13.50 25.05 *Prices subject to change. Revision dates subject to change in accordance with laws published by the FRA. 3/22

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