CSX Acquisition of Pan Am Railways

OK, I think Mr. Saftee has established that even if the present operator of the facility, Dragon Cement, has folded, the plant remains a source of traffic.

I would think, absent it getting wet, cement represents traffic that lends itself to rail transportation. But those of you actually on the ground up there, know to what extent away from where passenger train agencies with their taxpayer loot, Timmy let his 1:1 Lionel set go to pot, and that no shipper having a choice between rail and highway, would give him anything they didn't have to.

I believe part of the issue with that plant, like many others in New England, is that people simply don't want industry here. They were fined numerous times for I forgot what, and the effort to get natural gas to the plant to bring down their electricity operating costs was stymied several times. It may be a hard sell for another plant owner to re-open under those conditions.

Also, why would a cement company sell their cement factory to a competitor? Cement factory needs good & inexpensive access to sand, limestone, water, and fuel at a minimum.

Bigger firms have been known to sell their marginal assets to smaller firms in the past; there may be no difference between a large international cement firm selling a plant and a Class I selling a marginal line to a short line (Dragon Cement is owned by Cementos Portland Valderrivas, SA, a Spanish firm). That said, Dragon expects the shutdown of the their plant to conclude in 2025, so who knows what they will want to do with the plant after it's stopped operating.

Is it really going to happen that late? That's a lot of time for the locals to reverse course with the threat of job losses and allow the gas line.

CSX is only offering 23.43 for Lawrence and Portland Yards. No one is going to want to work for 23.43 when the real csx employees start out at 100%! When will the CSX/Panam pay to 100% happen?

When the employees move from the ST to CSX System operating agreements. CSX rather have the ST and all of its nuances gone too, but it takes two to tango. Now that the ST is not the carrier for PAS negotiations can begin.

I hear it may happen in the next couple of months or the next couple of years! Not sure who to belive, I would like to apply because those yards are close to me. But I'm not working for $23.42 an hour while someone else who goes to the same
csx school(Redi) gets paid double of what I get paid. Hopefully some more information will appear soon about the horrible Springfield Terminal pay that they're still offering for Panam yards.

You can thank Fink Sr. and Culliford for that, that was the carrier's doing, the unions wanted 100% to start.

When did Berkshire & Eastern finally take over operation of PAS?

Also, I believe that whoever said that PAS owns the Minuteman logo and it carried over is correct; the herald on the G&W site actually reads, "PAN AM SOUTHERN / operated by Berkshire & Eastern".

9/1

Gilbert B Norman wrote: ↑Wed Oct 25, 2023 5:57 pm OK, I think Mr. Saftee has established that even if the present operator of the facility, Dragon Cement, has folded, the plant remains a source of traffic.

I would think, absent it getting wet, cement represents traffic that lends itself to rail transportation. But those of you actually on the ground up there, know to what extent away from where passenger train agencies with their taxpayer loot, Timmy let his 1:1 Lionel set go to pot, and that no shipper having a choice between rail and highway, would give him anything they didn't have to.

Mr Norman,

The Dragon factory is located on a state owned branch line with a short line operator, so CSX does not have the loads originate or terminate on the system.

The state owned branch line is in decent condition, and meets the CSX main at Brunswick, which is the end of Downeaster territory, so the cement loads can move in a fairly timely manner.

Dragon Cement is remaining in business at other locations, but is saying that the Rockland location is no longer economically viable.

DownEast Scenic RR is acquiring SnowPlow #82 and a Ballast topper car from CSX. The snowplow currently is scheduled to be moved from Northern Maine Junction in Hermon to the DE RR facilities in Hancock(near Ellsworth). The plans are to restore the exterior of the plow and have it as a static display. The move is planned for Thursday, but could be moved to Friday.

newpylong wrote: ↑Thu Oct 26, 2023 5:51 am I believe part of the issue with that plant, like many others in New England, is that people simply don't want industry here. They were fined numerous times for I forgot what, and the effort to get natural gas to the plant to bring down their electricity operating costs was stymied several times. It may be a hard sell for another plant owner to re-open under those conditions.

The current owner of Dragon has neglected it for years. It should have been rebuilt many eons ago, but prior owners failed to make that investment. From what I gather, the plant has been worn out since the end of the Boston Big Dig. Since then the owners have limped it along. Currently they can only run the crusher at night, since it draws so much power it would cause blackouts in Rockland during the day. When its all said and done the plant needs $13 million in repairs to stay operational. Thats not including earth moving equipment and what not that needs to be replaced as well. They would have been able to access lower cost pet-coke, but the trestle they used to unload the cars on needs to be replaced. They ended up having a company from down south bring a excavator that straddles the cars unload them, which is why they sat for 3 or 4 months at the plant.

Thank you Mr. CPF, for establishing that the plant is simply worn out and needs to be closed. Nobody's mad at any railroad resulting in product moving over highways and Dragon has other facilities which can presumably accommodate the displaced workers.