Pan Am Southern / Patriot Corridor Discussion

690 wrote:220 cars + three engines for one of the trains, no detector malfunction. They are running some massive trains out there.

They're also lighter trains. IIRC, European freight cars typically have half the tonnage capacity of an American freight car.

newpylong wrote:Going to be an uphill battle to compete with the Water Level Route even for NS owning everyting outright.

Not really, it's about not just service but cost too. CSX is making the Worcester to Chicago run in about 2-3 days and NS is right there with them. From customer door-to-door you're look at 4-5 days New England to Chicago area, 6-7 to St. Paul and about 10 to the west coast. Actually, the big thing is truck capacity to move boxes, so it comes down to JB Hunt (which literally has no lack of drivers), HUB & brokers vs Schneider, Pacer(XPO), & other brokerson the CSX side. Right now, JB Hunt is devastating everyone and HUB is right behind them.... also the cost of moving a single unit by Hunt vs Schneider is about 10% - 20% different in favor of Hunt depending on lane. The only lane CSX providers beat NS providers cost wise is New England to the Southeast (Winter Haven/Jacksonville/Miami).

If NS opens up double stack capacity (which I'm sure they will) and adds a north/south train its going to shift a lot of traffic back to Ayer. Already Mechanicville is taking a large chunk away from CSX in Syracuse.... Not to mention the Water level route is CSX's primary artery from NYC area to Chicago... NS going via PA and runs a lot of intermodal jobs up the Pittsburg line out of Croxton. Also, NS has the advantage out of NYC going to Atlanta and Texas with the Crescent Corridor.

You should see how many stack trains, how fast they run, and the infrastructure in place on the NYC between Buffalo, Selkirk and Worcester and then compare to NS, D&H and B&M between Buffalo, Bing, Mechanicville and Ayer and you might see it differently. It isn't even comparable, like T-ball to Babe Ruth league.

The only thing they can compete with is price. CSX has them killed as far as transit time from the west and south and if that isn't the more important factor by a huge margin there would be more running on the B&M by now.

I have lived it first hand. You're comparing the wrong lines, you should be comparing the NYC to the PRR modern day, NS has quite a few trains that go just as fast (minus the slope). Now if Ayer, Micky or Bingo were on the line between New York and Chicago we'd be talking differently but they aren't so its not a fair comparison...

Also in terms of transit time customers only care about days and not hours, otherwise they'd go van truck. If the cost is right and its only an additional day on one carrier vs the next they can live with it. Guess how many boxes get left in the terminals a day due to lack of driver capacity in CSX vs NS... All I'm saying is Hunt always has enough drivers. Doesn't matter how fast your train is if you can't get it to the customer

BostonUrbEx wrote:

690 wrote:220 cars + three engines for one of the trains, no detector malfunction. They are running some massive trains out there.

They're also lighter trains. IIRC, European freight cars typically have half the tonnage capacity of an American freight car.

Amsterdam, New York, on the CSX Mohawk Sub.

Nonetheless, 220 cars of mixed freight is gonna be heavy regardless of whether it's European or American.

690 wrote:Amsterdam, New York, on the CSX Mohawk Sub.

LOL!

Ok, well, jeeze, that's a bit much then.

CN9634 wrote:I have lived it first hand. You're comparing the wrong lines, you should be comparing the NYC to the PRR modern day, NS has quite a few trains that go just as fast (minus the slope). Now if Ayer, Micky or Bingo were on the line between New York and Chicago we'd be talking differently but they aren't so its not a fair comparison...

Also in terms of transit time customers only care about days and not hours, otherwise they'd go van truck. If the cost is right and its only an additional day on one carrier vs the next they can live with it. Guess how many boxes get left in the terminals a day due to lack of driver capacity in CSX vs NS... All I'm saying is Hunt always has enough drivers. Doesn't matter how fast your train is if you can't get it to the customer

Why should we be comparing lines into New England to ones that arent? Everyone knows NS has lines just like the Water Level Route, but they aren't into New England! That's the whole point that I made.

The rest is fluff like I said CSX must be doing something right with a dozen + stacks jobs into NE a day.

That is the confusion.... Dozen plus stack jobs a day into New England is way more than reality. They offer 3 domestic services a day, one out of Springfield and two out of Worcester (one to Chicago and one to the Southeast). There might be a Z train in. There I forgot to account for but it's 3 pairs of trains daily not "dozens". If you see more, its a late train from the day before. NS runs two pairs of intermodal one from Micky and one from Ayer.

I meant to say Intermodal, not stacks.

I've lost track of what we are debatin here anymore. I guess we will have to wait and see what happens to the B&A if and when NS gets the B&M.

Believe NS might make the move to buy out PAR's 50% of PAS,WATCO might make the move to
buy the PAR remains.
NS needs to stay off EHH's radar,this could be the fix.

newpylong wrote:I meant to say Intermodal, not stacks.

I've lost track of what we are debatin here anymore. I guess we will have to wait and see what happens to the B&A if and when NS gets the B&M.

There aren't dozens of intermodals off the B&A, only a few. As compared to the B&M/PAS/NS line, you have 3 pairs of stack trains on CSX and 2 pairs on NS. The battle isn't so easy fox CSX, especially with JB Hunt on the side of NS (for the most part they hedge their way through both sides)

okay, to continue this nonsense let's be 100% subjective.

Please post all symbol pairs for possible intermodal trains on the B&A including stack and racks.

Then post them into Ayer. The NS trains into Mechanicville do you not count, not only is New York not New England but then we would need to count rack jobs terminating at Selkirk.

asull, who posts here off and on would be in a good position to give us the traffic on the B&A.

Mechanicville competes with traffic for Springfield so I'd count it

...let's be 100% subjective.

You mean objective. And if it's nonsense, why prompt a continuation (and further distort it) by bringing racks into the discussion?