CSX Acquisition of Pan Am Railways

Pan American World Airlines, a New Hampshire company, also does business as "Pan Am Brands" and claims to control the Pam Am brand (including its logo) and licenses it for all sorts of purposes, including, but not limited to clothing, watches, TV shows, and travel. As far as I can tell, that company was transferred to CSX as part of PAR and then sold by CSX to an investment firm.

jamoldover wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 8:39 am So is that who Timmy sold the Pan Am Airways brand to? IIRC he owned the entire trademark at one point.

Pan Am Brands was a wholly owned subsidiary of Pan Am Systems, and thus included in the sale of Pan Am Systems to CSX Transportation. I haven't seen any news stories regarding whether or not CSX retained ownership of Pan Am Brands or if they spun it off at some point after their purchase of Pan Am Systems was complete.

When it was first revealed (via STB filings) that Pan Am Brands was included in the sale, several of us noted the unlikely but absolutely tantalizing possibility that CSX could hold onto PAB and then rebrand themselves as Pan Am Railways. Clearly that didn't happen, but it's a fun idea for an alternate timeline model railroad. Imagine Pan Am ES44ACs hauling the Tropicana orange juice train...

I wonder if they retained the rights to put the Pan Am branding on a loco or two, as heritage engines. I picture one in blue dip, the other in the Smurf livery. Of course, I also waited with bated breath for PAR to brand a unit as "Pan American World Railways," but they never made that leap.

I believe we actually have (or had) a thread in here related to the ancillary product sales of Pan Am merchandise, as well as the short-lived TV show that completely wasted Christina Ricci but managed to introduce America to an unknown starlet named Margot Robbie.

Hopefully a Pan Am "Heritage" unit never sees the light of day. However a B&M or MEC (as actually predecessor roads and not a lame made up airline DBA name) heritage unit is more likely.

CSX will be doing a Pan Am unit in the future. That was already established after the original plans for the heritage program were leaked. Guessing they paid to use the name rights.

CPF66 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 7:29 am Guessing they paid to use the name rights.

Or licensed the rights to themselves for free before they sold Pan Am Brands to whoever they sold it to (if in fact they did sell it).

CPF66 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 7:29 am CSX will be doing a Pan Am unit in the future. That was already established after the original plans for the heritage program were leaked. Guessing they paid to use the name rights.

Says who? Also why would they do a Pan Am heritage unit when there are still plenty of PAR Yugos running around in that very paint?

To play devil's advocate, one possible reason they might consider doing a PAR heritage unit is because they're exclusively using ES44ACs for their heritage unit program. They want the heritage units to be able to roam freely on all the CSX mainlines. The ex-PAR units probably aren't reliable enough for CSX to let them go very far from home.

It was in the original proposal for the heritage unit program which was leaked by a railfan out of Florida named Henry Goodbread on Instagram. At the time no one believed it, but considering we are up to 20 something units now, I think the credibility has been established.
Yes, there are Pan Am units running around, your point? UP still has CNW and SP units running around and yet they have heritage units. CN has WC, BLE, DMIR, among other units running around and they have heritage units. But yes, there are Pan Am units running around which don't fit the style of heritage unit CSX is going for.

MEC407 wrote:To play devil's advocate, one possible reason they might consider doing a PAR heritage unit is because they're exclusively using ES44ACs for their heritage unit program. They want the heritage units to be able to roam freely on all the CSX mainlines. The ex-PAR units probably aren't reliable enough for CSX to let them go very far from home.

The Pan Am units are staying in Maine since they either lack PTC, or aren't equipped with the system that the rest of the known world outside MBTA uses.

You don't need PTC on a trailing locomotive, but you don't see Pan Am locos as trailers on the rest of the CSX network much either.

CPF66 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 10:36 amThe Pan Am units are staying in Maine since they either lack PTC, or aren't equipped with the system that the rest of the known world outside MBTA uses.

MBTA uses the same ACSES II system that the entire NEC uses, although they may lack I-ETMS that the freight railroads use. I'd think that CSX's ACSES II equipped locos for NEC service on CSX and CSAO are probably dual equipped.

CPF66 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 10:36 am It was in the original proposal for the heritage unit program which was leaked by a railfan out of Florida named Henry Goodbread on Instagram. At the time no one believed it, but considering we are up to 20 something units now, I think the credibility has been established.
Yes, there are Pan Am units running around, your point? UP still has CNW and SP units running around and yet they have heritage units. CN has WC, BLE, DMIR, among other units running around and they have heritage units. But yes, there are Pan Am units running around which don't fit the style of heritage unit CSX is going for.

MEC407 wrote:To play devil's advocate, one possible reason they might consider doing a PAR heritage unit is because they're exclusively using ES44ACs for their heritage unit program. They want the heritage units to be able to roam freely on all the CSX mainlines. The ex-PAR units probably aren't reliable enough for CSX to let them go very far from home.

The Pan Am units are staying in Maine since they either lack PTC, or aren't equipped with the system that the rest of the known world outside MBTA uses.

I guess we'll see what they end up doing. I think B&M or MEC units would be far more appropriate.

That is not entirely true about the ex-PAR units. When CSX and all other Class I are implementing things like Trip Optimizer to save every penny the last thing they are going to do is let Tier 0 units that they already sold once roam all over, even in a trailing position. They keep them close to home for that reason and the Waterville workforce knows the units well. In general when they're dead and cannot be resurrected other CSX units will be shuffled in. They'll get their monies worth out of them and move on.

If CSX paints a Pan Am heritage unit, I'm quite sure it will be in addition to — not in lieu of — B&M and MEC heritage units.

The mystery is which B&M and MEC paint schemes will they choose.

$65K will get you a seat on Pan Am’s 12 day tour of former Pam Am hotspots (and I don’t mean Waterville, E Deerfield, or Rigby Yard!):

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://w ... 7CBinJUpEd

Its just a guess, but couldn't CSX have just retained the rights to the Pan Am Railways branding, while casting off the rights to the airline name?