Salem Action Alert

Did you mean 2015 or is it really 16? What does an embargo mean. Thanks!

It's a joke.

An embargo is where a carrier refuses shipments.

Not a joke....unless its a typo in the filing. Seriously. Note that moves are
allowed by permit, so there is hope if there's a decent melt.

D

Picked that news from ANRP newest e-bulletin issued this morning.
The embargo was filed 2/13/15 and goes until 2/13/16.

Also includes Salem, which covers Univar at Castle Hill.

There are still loads from before the first blizzard in old Yard 8 Somerville for
Peabody.

D

I somewhat doubt the railroad expects to be in business as Pan Am Railways on 2/13/2016 the way this is going, so the embargo may be a meaningless prognosticator about future rail service to Univar and Rousselot.


Now where's the next embargo domino going to going to fall? This ain't the only low-volume branchline that's going to be sandbagged in the immediate term to slow the free-fall. Not by a longshot.

Considering PAS has an embargo filed for industries in Ayer that was filed around the same time & expires in a year (unless it is cancelled), I can believe that this track has one as well.

Sorry Dave I thought you were kidding, because something like this is just laughable.

Noob question: What exactly is an "embargo" and what does it mean for the Salem traffic?

Tracer wrote:Noob question: What exactly is an "embargo" and what does it mean for the Salem traffic?

It's a temporary order refusing service to active customers because of unsafe track conditions or other such hardship in delivering the loads, and while the embargo is in effect any traffic has to be OK'd for approval. It's not abandonment or placing the line out of service (which is why the embargo includes Univar on the very very much active Eastern Route mainline), though it can be used as the first step for forcing that process a couple years down the line. It's a supervised suspension of service. And it can be lifted at any time. They're going to have a tougher case making it stick with Univar than they will with Rousselot, which is why it's way too early to jump to any conclusions. They crapped the bed bigtime, but it doesn't mean the deliveries won't be back. That's unknowable right now mid-crisis.


Basically, the system-wide meltdown and the fact that they haven't even dug out the pre-blizzard loads for Rousselot that have been sitting for weeks in Somerville means they've got way bigger problems to square than just finding a snowplow to plow out the tracks in Peabody. Ayer is paralyzed so Lawrence is paralyzed so Somerville is paralyzed so Salem/Peabody is paralyzed, and right now even thinking ahead to Somerville is an unreliable proposition. Each bigger link in the chain has to get stabilized before there's even the capability to get there...and with just how big a crisis the system is in that means the snow in Peabody is going to be half-melted by the time they're capable of addressing Univar's and Rousselot's status. So the embargo is a stop-loss maneuver letting them concentrate on much bigger and much more threatening short-term worries.

i worked in salem today, row is so covered. i don't blame them for not cleaning it up, i mean you're talking miles of track for one customer. i know what i get to run my bobcat to do snow, and how much i can move. using a front loader would simply be unfeasible. it would HAVE to be a snow plow and i'm sure they are all tied up. the fact that rousellote covered their spur after the first storm tells me that they've known for a while.

Not to be picky, but it really is not that far from the active line in Salem to Peabody...maybe 2 miles, tops. And a plow would not be feasible for a whole host of reasons, which includes the fact that at the Grove Street crossing the adjacent business has piled all their snow onto the right of way. A loader would be the only way, or the spring melt

You are right, there is no excuse. You use a loader to bust apart the crossings and you plow the rest. Unfortunately, not enough equipment or crews to do any of that. Sad.

any news?

tom18287 wrote:any news?

They're predicting temps in the 40's and 50's next week so downtown Peabody's probably gonna flood real good from the runoff that has no un-buried storm drains to collect. And the tracks will still be covered in 4 feet of ever-so-slightly diminished but ever-so-greatly more heavy/waterlogged snow pack.


Way too early. There's still embargoes slapped all over businesses on the Patriot Corridor because Pan Am hasn't moved enough trains out there in the last couple weeks to dig out of the hole that kicked off this systemwide ops collapse. They're not going to be normal enough again out there the rest of this month to even think about Univar and Rousselot before the end of April.

Thursday am: front end loader working to clear the line from Salem toward Peabody! He has cleared the lead from the yard to the main, both tracks in the yard and was working toward Flint Street when I saw him again around noon. It should be an interesting move once things get cleared!
Steve