STB Moves Ahead on Private Car Proceeding

Federal regulators moving ahead with a rule making case that will consider a proposal by private rail car owners to update the demurrage and accessorial rules governing use by railroads of these cars.

The owners sought the rule making process in July. After a public comment period, the U.S. Surface Transportation board has decided to open such a proceeding because, “Petitioners’ proposal and the responses to date raise important issues of interest to the Board.”

The car owners want the STB to adopt regulations that would allow car owners to assess a “private rail car delay charge” when a private freight car does not move for more than 72 consecutive hours at any point between the time it is released for transportation and the time it is “constructively placed or actually placed” at the private rail car provider’s facility or designated location.

Since the car owners through their trade associations proposed the rule in July, the STB has received public comments from various shippers and railroads.

The latter oppose the rule with the Association of American Railroads arguing that the STB lacks legal authority under federal law to adopt the proposed rules.

AAR along with some of its members contend the proposed rule are unnecessary because carriers have sufficient incentives to move cars efficiently. Delayed cars hinder operations and reduce revenue.

The railroads have likewise argued that the proposed rules will result in inefficient operations as railroads are motivated to move private cars in order to avoid charges.

For their part, the rail car owners and their trade associations argue that the proposed rules will provide incentives for Class I railroads to make “efficient use of private rail cars without unduly infringing upon the railroads’ freight operations over their respective systems, recognizing that some level of service variability is inherent in any railroad’s operations.”

In seeking the rule changes, the rail car owners said approximately 73 percent of the rail cars in service – about 1.2 million cars – are no longer owned by railroads.

These cars are used by railroads at little or no cost to them, the car owners contend.

A UP Kind of Day

This past Wednesday was a Union Pacific kind of day. It began with catching a former Union Pacific 10-6 sleeping car on the rear of Amtrak’s westbound Lake Shore Limited in Chesterton, Indiana.

The car, now owned by Webb Rail, was built in June 1950 by Budd. In its current reiteration, it read “Pullman” in the letterboard and “Pacific Union” in the car name space.

A few hours later I had ventured further east to Otis, Indiana, where I caught Norfolk Southern train 39E coming around a curve with a pair of UP motors.

The train originates in Elkhart and goes to the UP at Proviso Yard in Chicago.

Groups Private Car Rules Revised

Four groups that represent private freight car owners want the U.S. Surface Transportation Board to launch a rule making process to work toward updating the demurrage and accessorial rules governing the railroads’ use and handling of their equipment.

The petition to the STB asks regulators “to promulgate regulations governing the use by the nation’s Class I railroads of freight rail cars supplied to them by rail car owners, shippers, and other non-railroad entities. [A]n update to the rules governing the railroads’ use of private rail cars is long overdue because the railroad industry has evolved to the point that approximately 73 percent of the rail cars in service today nationwide – approximately 1.2 million rail cars—are no longer owned by railroads, but are . . . purchased, or leased, and maintained, by non-railroad entities at little or no cost to the railroads that use them.”

The groups involved are the North America Freight Car Association, the National Grain and Feed Association, the Chorine Institute and the National Oilseed Processors Association.

They say that current STB rules failed to adequately protect the enormous investment private rail car owners have made in their property because the rules fail to provide sufficient incentives for the Class I railroads to use private rail cars efficiently.

The petition said Class 1 railroads are using private cars in irregular service and holding on to them for too long.

Amtrak Won’t Allow Being on Open Platform Cars

Amtrak has revised its safety manual for private rail car owners to prohibit passengers aboard open platform cars from riding or standing on the platform while the car is in motion.

The manual said the rule applies to cars attached to any Amtrak revenue train or charter operation.

“Failure to adhere to this safety rule could result in the private car owner being suspended or revoked from operation on any Amtrak train or charter train,” the rules states.

A related rule requires that vestibule doors and windows shall be closed and latched before a train departs and remain closed until it comes to a halt at the next station.

The safety manual is a 15-page documents that spells out in detail Amtrak’s rules and expectations for private car owners and their passengers.

The manual also notes that starting on May 14, 2018, the procedure for scheduling the annual, 40 Year, and 10 year follow-up inspections is now being managed Amtrak’s Centralized National Operations Center.

Amtrak’s mechanical maintenance facilities are no longer available to perform these periodic inspections.

Some Private Car Owners Disappointed With Amtrak Changes

In the aftermath of a change in Amtrak policy for handling of private rail cars, some car owners told Trains magazine they are disappointed in the new policy and how the passenger carrier is jacking up the fees it charges to haul and service their cars.

Amtrak’s new policy restricts where private rail cars will be handled and in particular limits where the cars can be added or removed from Amtrak trains at intermediate stations.

Some car owners said the higher tariffs and operating restrictions will make their business more challenging and expensive.

Some car owners are trying to be philosophical with Altiplano Railtours owner Adam Auxier telling Trains it is better to have bad news you know than good news you don’t know.

Auxier said private car owners need to be able to plan their trips nearly a year in advance.

Many private car owners sell tickets to the public to ride in their cars on set dates.

Railroad Passenger Car Alliance President Roger W. Fuehring told Trains that some changes in how Amtrak handled private cars is disappointing.

In particular he cited the inability to store cars near Washington Union Station, the ending of some mechanical services, and a sudden increase in fees.

Fuehring said Amtrak had increased its tariffs every October, but now has warned private car owners that those fees can be increased at anytime at Amtrak’s discretion.

“How can anyone plan their business with such small margins when we don’t know what the tariff rates will be day to day?” Fuehring said. “What does the tariff matter if Amtrak has the ability to adjust the rates again?”

Burt Hermey owns four original California Zephyr cars that he stores in Los Angeles.

He said the fee increases are putting him into the difficult position of having to tell his customers they need to pay more for upcoming trips.

Hermey said he created fares based on the October 2017 tariffs.

He explained that Amtrak will now only do what is necessary to bring a car that is in the middle of a trip back into FRA compliance.

“A strict reading of that would seem to indicate that defects identified during an annual inspection would need to be repaired elsewhere,” Hermey said.

Hermey believes that the rule changes show that, “Amtrak management wants us off the property despite the multiple millions of dollars we pay each year, most of which flows to their bottom line. It’s also clear how little they value that segment of their business.”

Amtrak Raising Private Rail Car Fees

As Amtrak is restricting where private railroad cars can operate it is also jacking up the rates that it charges to carry, switch and store them.

A new fee structure effective May 1 will increase the base rate to carry a private car will be $3.26 per mile, an increase of more than 12 percent from the current rate of $2.90 per mile.

Additional cars will be $2.50 per mile, up from the current $2.22 base rate.

The overnight base parking fee will rise to $155 with some facilities charging even more.

In Portland, Oregon, for example, the overnight parking rate will be $270. In Boston it will be $360. In Chicago, the premium daily parking rate will be $600.

Short-term and long-term parking fees are also rising to $2,400, up from $2,085 for short time parking and $1,600 per month, an increase from $1,391, for long-term parking.

Terminal switching fees and waste-tank service costs now incur an annual $400 administrative fee.

Amtrak last increased fees for private car owners on Oct. 1, 2017, using an Association of American Railroads quarterly index of prices and wage rates.

In its latest private car tariffs, Amtrak said its rates are subject to change “from time to time at the discretion of Amtrak.”

Amtrak Clarifies Policy on Specials, Private Cars

Amtrak has clarified its new policy on special moves and the carriage of private railroad cars and as expected the passenger carrier is largely eliminating moves to and from intermediate points.

The guidelines say Amtrak will only accommodate private car moves at endpoint terminals or intermediate stations where the scheduled dwell time is sufficient to allow switching of the cars.

Amtrak listed 40 intermediate stations where switching will be permitted. The list includes such points as Albuquerque, New Mexico; Denver; Houston; Kansas City; and St. Paul, Minnesota, but no cities in Ohio.

Private cars can also be added or removed from Amtrak trains at Pontiac, Michigan; Indianapolis; and Pittsburgh. However, the latter is limited to the Pennsylvanian, which originates and terminates in Pittsburgh.

Also excluded are Grand Rapids and Port Huron in Michigan, both of which are endpoints for the Pere Marquette and Blue Water respectively.

Nor is Huntington, West Virginia, included on the list. The omission of Huntington is notable because it is the origin of the annual New River Train and the home of the fleet of cars owned by the Collis P. Huntington Railroad Historical Society.

Amtrak said it will work with private rail car owners whose cars are marooned at prohibited intermediate switching stops on a one-time, one-way relocation move to a terminal or yard where private cars will still be permitted to operate.

The movement of private cars will also requires case-by-case written approval by Amtrak.

Amtrak plans to limit maintenance service for private-car owners to Federal Railroad Administration mandated repairs of safety appliances as necessary on private cars in the consist of Amtrak trains.

Private car owners will no longer be permitted to pay Amtrak’s maintenance services for preventative maintenance and general repair services. In the past Amtrak staff undertook such repairs and then billed the car owner for the work.

As for special moves and charters, Amtrak said those will be limited to existing Amtrak routes.

The guidelines also said Amtrak will continue to accommodate specials and charters that are already established in the Amtrak system. They must not be one-time trips.

That is good news for the annual New River Train, which uses the route of the Chicago-Washington Cardinal, but not so good news for the rare mileage specials sponsored by the American Association of Private Railroad Car Owners.

Would-be operators of chartered trains that use Amtrak locomotives, equipment and personnel will be subject to the availability of those resources and their operation must not adversely affect scheduled operations.

A charter must also generate sufficient financial benefit for Amtrak to justify its use of its equipment and personnel, but the carrier did not explain how it calculates those.

The updated guidelines on charters and special moves do not apply to trains operated by Amtrak on its own or for governmental purposes.

New River Train Will Still Run

West Virginia public officials say that Amtrak has committed to operating the New River Train this fall despite a recent policy change that banned such special moves.

Gov. Jim Justice and U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins said Amtrak CEO Richard Anderson agreed after a telephone conversation to allow the train to operate for its 52^nd season.

During that conversation, Jenkins and Mike Hall, the governor’s chief of staff, discussed with Anderson the importance of the 300-mile passenger excursion that runs the third and fourth weekends of October between Huntington and Hinton.

“I am very encouraged after our call with Richard Anderson that we have a commitment to resolving issues with the New River Train,” said Jenkins, whose district includes much of the route of the train over the former Chesapeake & Ohio mainline used by Amtrak’s tri-weekly Chicago-Washington Cardinal.

Jenkins said Anderson indicated that the passenger carrier is receptive to making “some limited exemptions to its ban on charter trains.”

Amtrak has not yet said what criteria it will follow for allowing special train and charter moves.

Even before the policy change was revealed last month, owners of private rail cars had reported that Amtrak was increasingly rejecting their requests to have their cars attached to scheduled trains on some routes.

Amtrak also declined to operate a special for the American Association of Private Railroad Car Owners between Nebraska and Denver.

Amtrak Holding Firm on PTC View

Amtrak is doubling down on an assertion made earlier this year to Congress by its CEO Richard Anderson that it will not operate on routes that are required to have positive train control but which fail to make the deadline to installing it.

Amtrak’s executive vice president and chief commercial officer, Stephen Gardner, told a House Appropriations Committee hearing that Amtrak still has not decided if it will use routes that are not required to have PTC.

Gardner said the passenger carrier continues to study whether it can safely operate on PTC-exempt routes, which tend to be on regional railroads.

He acknowledged during the hearing that Amtrak’s Chicago-Los Angeles Southwest Chief might be adversely affected by the PTC issue.

However, Gardner qualified his testimony by suggesting that Amtrak might use routes that receive an extension from the Federal Railroad Administration of the Dec. 31, 2018, PTC deadline that is mandated by federal law.

As did Anderson, Gardner said there will be segments of routes used by Amtrak over which the carrier won’t operate if a PTC waiver has not been obtained by the host railroad.

“ . . . We believe PTC is part of a modern passenger rail system and we want to see PTC levels of safety across our network. We’re going to be analyzing those areas where safety improvements can be made,” Gardner said.

When pressed by Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-California) about the Southwest Chief, Gardner said Amtrak “will provide service on the portions of the route that have PTC, but there may be parts of our network where we believe PTC is required – if that route has high operating speeds – and we want to make sure we have a single level of safety across our network.”

Gardner said Amtrak route safety assessment will conclude this summer.

The Southwest Chief route is required to have PTC between Albuquerque and Lamy, New Mexico, where Amtrak shares tracks with Rail Runner commuter trains.

However, the route between Lamy and Trinidad, Colorado, is exempted. The former Santa Fe route used by the Chief across Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico has an automatic train stop system that dates from the 1920s.

It requires a locomotive engineer to acknowledge any restrictive signal indication or suffer a penalty brake application.

Gardner also took a shot at Amtrak’s host railroads for creating an “existential crisis” by delaying its trains through freight train interference.

He called for legislation allowing Amtrak to sue host railroads over failure to give passenger trains dispatching priority.

Asked why Amtrak is giving up special trains and restricting its carriage of private passenger cars, Gardner said the carrier is restricting the number of places that it operates to its core network.

He noted that some specials and charters have used routes not covered by scheduled Amtrak trains and that any additional revenue it made from those moves caused “a minimum amount of disruption and distraction away from our core business.”

He said going off network exposed Amtrak to new operating challenges and safety risks.

Gardner said Amtrak’s goal is to offer services on its current routes “where we can use equipment that we are confident in and the requirements on our end are manageable, not a distraction, and do not divert our core staff from the job of becoming fully PTC implemented, focusing on improving on-time performance, and providing great customer service.”

AAPRCO Special Rolls Through Cleveland

On Sunday morning a seven-car American Association of Private Railroad Car Owners special went west through Cleveland.

The special consisted of Amtrak P42DC’s 134 and 190; Pennsylvania 120; Juniata Terminal’s Warrior Ridge; Morristown and Erie’s Alexander Hamilton; former New York Central 43, Mount Vernon; former Pullman Pacific Home; and former NYC Babbling Brook.

I caught the special going through Berea and thought it looked somewhat like the Great Steel Fleet that the New York Central ran in the postwar era.

I probably should have gone to a more representative location such as Olmsted Falls with the depot but sometimes you take what you can get.

Article and Photographs by Todd Dillon