CSX Acquisition of Pan Am Railways

I think people are seriously underestimating the potential growth in traffic off of the Irvings roads. It's not just Lumber, they serve 4 large Pulp & Paper Mills, a huge refinery that even without CBR ships several thousand cars per year, Wallboard, LPG, fertilizer, etc. CSX won't even have to compete on much of this business as they'll end up serving both the origin and destination on a lot of this traffic. With better equipment supply and transit times I could easily picture them doubling or tripling ST's current share of this business.

Regarding the prospect of csx controlling both origin and destination of some volume of Irving business, what Irving facilities does pan am serve? Having never lived farther north than central Mass, I always thought the bulk of Irving’s industries were in New Brunswick. What do the have in New England served by pan am? Would like to know

Before PAR thought it was brilliant to stop going to Keag (and began paying someone else to move the NBSR-CSX traffic,) the SJPOs were always 50 cars but sometimes 80 cars every other day at the end. I could see this traffic coming back, and then some, with little effort on CSX's part.

CSX isn't going to over-commit in the filing and will keep their cards as close as they can. Giving away too much of the long-term strategy is a bad business decision. They've said what needs to be said to hopefully keep the STB and the competitors happy enough to allow the acquisition to proceed. They are improving the status quo somewhat with some track upgrades and improved motive power.

Once the acquisition happens plans go into motion that have both short and long-term impacts. They may find there are locations worth running in excess of 25mph depending on how they want to structure their crews, but as some other posters have pointed out going from 10 to 25 is a huge change, cutting transit time by more than half. With no work at Ayer they could run Worcester-Portland on one crew consistently even with dodging passenger trains and worming through the Hill Yard. Probably a 6-7 hour run if Worcester to Lowell Junction is 25mph on the mainline. Add some time for crew signup and passenger trains and you're doing it in 8-10 hours consistently.

F74265A wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 7:36 pm Regarding the prospect of csx controlling both origin and destination of some volume of Irving business, what Irving facilities does pan am serve? Having never lived farther north than central Mass, I always thought the bulk of Irving’s industries were in New Brunswick. What do the have in New England served by pan am? Would like to know

What I'm saying is that CSX currently originates or terminates quite a bit of traffic that moves to or from the Irving roads where up until now they have been interchange partner neutral, with much of the business being interchanged at Albany (CPRS) or Huntington (CN) and likely even Detroit and Toledo. Now that with the Pan Am takeover CSX will have direct access to those same Irving road customers, they will without a doubt price in such a way that they will be able to handle the business on a single line CSX direct routing and there is little the Canadian roads can do to prevent that from happening. It's about as low hanging fruit as you will find in the rail business.

That makes sense
Thanks

CSX has shareholders to answer to, so from a strategy standpoint they wouldn’t be picking up Pan Am if they didn’t foresee growth and untapped potential, which the execs will need to explain in the future. I’d agree the STB app should be taken for what it is worth, which is to get them to approve the application and move on.

CSX most definitely has significant plans for growth with this acquisition, both short term and long term. As others have pointed out, any proposed changes they cite will only serve to generate further STB scrutiny, so why rock the boat.

Missed this about Vermont Rail offered haulage rights:

https://railsandports.com/2021/05/haula ... il-system/

Thats a suitable remedy in lieu of trackage rights-- although given the relatively small size of the three corridors in question (HJCT to RJCT likewise to Mechanicville, as well as WRJ/BF to EDFLD) the latter would work as well and if I were VRS I'd push for that for greater control of your own destiny. In broader cases of additional operating costs relative trackage rights, obviously you don't want to pickup TR over a 300-mile distance.... conversely the trouble with haulage rights while the cost competitiveness in theory is intact, you are still relying on the other guy to move things in a timely manor.

At some point I think the "what ifs" need to take a back seat to the current situation. Could GWI possibly raise rates with the market or provide poor service in the future? Perhaps... But right now VRS is having PAS haul next to nothing for them. The applicants are providing reasonable assurances that interchange possibilities will remain open. It is their property, not VRS's. Sometimes you take what you get. If they want another alternative that bad they can ask CP for haulage/trackage down to Mohawk or something.

As for that article. awfully easy to knock the larger railroads when you are basically a state assigned operator and don't pay a cent on property taxes. I wouldn't want my little world to change either.

J.D. Lang wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:26 pm That's why there are so many letters of support from Maine shippers to the STB. The only thing that puzzles me is there hasn't been any public support from the state of Maine where as some other states have submitted support letters to the STB. You would think that Maine would see the benefits to its economy from a robust rail network.

I just listened to this month's NNEPRA board meeting, and it was only today that the board approved participation in the CSX proceedings by NNEPRA staff. The comment was made that NNEPRA and MaineDOT are working closely together on this, so now that that approval is out of the way I'd expect to see their names pop up in the STB docket search.

markhb wrote: ↑Mon May 10, 2021 2:02 pm

J.D. Lang wrote: ↑Mon May 03, 2021 3:26 pm That's why there are so many letters of support from Maine shippers to the STB. The only thing that puzzles me is there hasn't been any public support from the state of Maine where as some other states have submitted support letters to the STB. You would think that Maine would see the benefits to its economy from a robust rail network.

I just listened to this month's NNEPRA board meeting, and it was only today that the board approved participation in the CSX proceedings by NNEPRA staff. The comment was made that NNEPRA and MaineDOT are working closely together on this, so now that that approval is out of the way I'd expect to see their names pop up in the STB docket search.

Was filed today

This is going to be interesting to watch. It really shakes things up in New England by somewhat flipping some of the traffic between the B&M and B&A lines. G&W will now have their own route out of New England to connect with NECR, P&W and CSOR. The small bit of PAS in Connecticut will likely become effectively part of CSOR. It is interesting though that CSX is going for a lot of convoluted, circuitous shared freight/passenger local operations in New England, which seems to be opposite of the M.O. of the Class Is to just pursue large amounts of traffic in unit trains, intermodal, autos, and to hand off to short lines.

budd6209 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 28, 2021 4:59 pm Just saw on the STB site that there are business are in Connecticut are supporting the transaction. They think that they are having CSX serve them. By the filing Berkshire and Eastern will be serve them instead of CSX.

Do you have a link to those filings? The STB site isn't the most user friendly thing around.