To answer your question, is it hard to learn you're way around. It's not bad, but it's not a slam dunk either. There's a lot of rules between railroads and yes there's a lot of stuff, but you won't be alone. Your engineer and your conductor will help you A LOT normally. Just remember when you go into training, you have two ears and one mouth, use them in that ratio! Listen. Don't pretend like you know it all, that makes everyone annoyed. Ask questions, guys like to know you are sure you're doing the right thing. Keep a low profile, always be on time. During training, NEVER miss a call out, that's a death sentence. NEVER be late, if you have an accident or a problem, CALL your training coordinator ahead of time. If you have a problem only once and you let everyone know, it's no problem, but if you don't or you have more than one or two, you're history. The training coordinator can fail you and not have to explain. In St. Louis, the guy is an ok person. In fact, in St. Louis, everyone was very nice, a lot of decent guys. And the yard is in an easy to get to place, so if that's where you end up, you could do A LOT WORSE and not much better. Yardmasters and trainmasters are good people in general there also.
In terms of positioning yourself for hiring, you've done what you need to and about all you can. With BNSF and KCS, NARS is a big deal, in terms of showing preparation and interest. Rail work, especially train crew is very specialized, so in terms of those specific skills, not much more. Yes, what you learned is must an overview and a sampler, but it's way beyond what anyone off the street has. Your NARS training will mean more than virtually anything else you will do between now and when the economy breaks. So in terms of that, you're set.
Other things that help, it sounds like you're in about the right spot, I assume that the distribution center involves a lot of team work and planning. Train crew work is being able to work with others on tactical plans. Every day is different, so what you'll want to do is spin any job you have between now and then in terms of, how you're good at working with a small team, being able to adapt when the situation changes and come up with new plans, and most of all you'll be emphasizing that how you understand safety and and you know the work rules and how to follow them but at the same time get the job done as efficiently as is possible. So between now and probably early to mid next year, just keep working on your presentation of how all your jobs contribute to those ends, team work, flexibility, safety. Visualize what it will be like to have your one shot, the interviewer and one other person sitting across from you, and asking why they should hire YOU over the 100 others out there right now. Play that over and over, on your drive to work, play it out loud, it sounds different than when you say things in your head. Think of surprises they might throw at you. For those few moments, you're a salesman, and the product you're selling is you. Do that between now and then, and you'll be able to go in and sound polished, like you've really researched the job well, and know it, that level of enthusiasum coupled with your NARS background and your research will make them think of you as a lock. It's like sports, practice hard and long, so when the real game comes, your ready, it's fun, and you win.
Things to watch out for, avoid any driving blemishes all that sort of thing between now and then, a DWI or a DUI is a death sentence, avoid any kind of substances, they drug test before hiring and then randomly afterward. Someone on drugs will get people on your team killed, there is no wiggle room there, but based on your posts I really doubt any of these warning apply to you, but just for informations sake. And keep applying, when 6 months is up, reapply and apply for any jobs you see coming up. Yes, it may SEEM like a waste of time, but it isn't. down in Ft. Worth, they will keep seeing your name show up month after month, and they'll know you're still interested. It will make a difference. Remember about reapplying every 6 months unless you already got a BNSF new hire letter and your class was cancelled. If that happened, then you're on a short list anyway of those they'll call back when the situation breaks.
If that's the case, what will happen is this. I think you said St. Louis was where you applied, well, when hiring starts, you may wonder if they're every going to call, you'll see postings all over, but they'll have the schedule, and St. Louis will be on it, as the time approaches for a class there, totally out of the blue, you'll get a call from someone. And it may NOT BE BNSF, in my case it was A YEAR later, I'm driving to the car wash and suddenly I get a call from a drug testing lab, asking me to set an appointment time for my employment drug test. I'm wondering what the (*&(* is THIS all about. So I called them back, and asked for what and they told me, for BNSF railway in Ft. Worth. I was like totally blown away, so I set it up, and go in. The next day, some lady from BNSF calls and asks if I'm still interested (by that time I'm working at Lowes). Just when I thought it would NEVER happen, and I'd forgotten about it, blam, totally didn't see it coming. Couldn't believe it, I went from having spent months wondering what would ever become of me to, I"VE GOT A FUTURE! So hang in there. And NARS in my case made all the difference. They did NOT advertise the class, it was all NARS grads only. And I've talked to a lot of guys who've had similar experiences, since late 2005 hiring was slowing down. Railroads lead the rest of the economy into recessions, but they also lead back out, BNSF's volumes will start to recover and they will start hiring before the rest of the economy starts recovery. That's because businesses have to start restocking inventories before business really starts to pick up. And from what I hear, the railroads think it will be late 2009 before things start to pick up,
If that holds, your class will probably be rescheduled in late 09 or early in 2010. If it's late 2009, (the most likely scenario, unless the economy gets even worse) you'll go through training and it will end about a week before Christmas. You'll mark up, but things will slow down and you'll probably end up being furloughed in early to mid January. You'll stay on the furlough board until probably early March, (maybe only mid February) and then you'll be called back, and work will pick up from there. For the next two years, make sure to save enough money to help with bills for the January / Feb swoon, as being low on seniority you'll get furloughed then, but after that, you'll be good.
So just hang in there. Review your presentation if you've not been interviewed yet, be prepared, but don't be a phoney, just be yourself, answer all the questions truthfully and be open, keep reapplying, and keep the record clean. You'll make it, it's just an issue of when.