Originally posted by Pete D:
Originally posted by sigma:
It wouldn't be a bad idea if we weren't operating at or beyond capacity throughout much of the rail industry. Unlike trucks we can't just stick another train on the rails and expect the government to build some new infrastructure when what we have is backed-up.



Is this nationwide or in your region? Trains seem to be a rare occurance here in the Northeast despite a pretty good infrastructure (although I am sure they are probably taking tracks up )



Individual regions of rail infrastructure are not particularly overtaxed. The problem lies in the major corridors: Seattle --> Chicago, LA --> Chicago, Chicago --> New York, etc, etc. These routes see upwards of 120 trains a day. So, while you may not see many trains on the line by your house, and the guy across town might not see many trains on his line, all those lines eventually dump into one terminal where they all try to get out onto a major line. And then several of those trunk lines dump into a major transcontinental line.

Railroads operate on a hub infrastructure much like many airlines do. But, unlike airlines which can fly virtually anywhere they need to get where they need to go, railroads are limited to a set route that all the traffic must funnel through. Imagine if every flight in the nation headed West had to get in 3 flight paths right behind one another, largely unable to pass one another, and they all flew through the same central airports -- Kansas City or Chicago (and most trains go through both). To truly appreciate the scale of railroading in the US you really should go see Argentine Yard in Kansas City if you're ever in the area. 1000 acres, as far as you can see, are trains, locomotives, and railcars (12,000 railcars sitting in the yard on a given day). Over 120 trains a day run through, 6,000 cars come through the yard, 3,000 rail cars a day are sorted (a process of free-rolling a car down a hill into tracks holding trains for particular destinations), over ten thousand more cars just run through. And that's just one yard (we have 2 yards in KC) of one railroad in one city.

No matter where you originate and terminate, chances are a railcar is going to have to travel on the major Transcontinental Routes that are at or beyond capacity. So, if I wanted to ship something from Houston to Maine, it can easily get from Houston to Kansas City by rail, but then must go from Kansas City to Chicago on the major South Transcon, and from Chicago to New York on another major line. Then it could be put on a line where it would easily make it up to Maine. With congestion the way it is, this would take anywhere from 10 to 30 days -- compared to about 3 days for a Truck. That's a HUGE inventory savings for a company. The added cost of shipping by track is easily offset by the fact you have don't have to have 10 times as much product in your supply chain.

And the reason you see a lot of track being torn up is because it's incredibly expensive to maintain it. And the government dictates that any laid rail that hasn't been officially abandoned (a process that requires you show that no customer has requested even one car in a number of years) be maintained to full operating capability. So, if we can get it tore up for scrap or sold off to someone else, we do. Rest assured there's no track being removed on the major routes. In fact we're adding it as fast as we can afford too, double-tracking the entire routes, triple-tracking many areas; but it's incredibly expensive. A single mile of fresh rail can run several million dollars; tens of millions in some terrain, and hundreds of millions if it's a tunnel or bridge. And we've got 32,000 miles of mainline track.

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