CSX Acquisition of Pan Am Railways

Agree Framingham makes no sense.
Sounds like you think there is a bit of flexibility in Worcester on w side

It seems like 426/427 & 115 all get built or broken up on that stretch of track while I think 436 goes all the way into the East Worcester yard. They can probably free up some of that space if they had to by running more run-through trains to Ayer, PW, etc.

Still unresolved in the public info so far is how ns will route pw auto racks since it cannot do any local work or set outs between VO and hill yard once the NS “premium” as they call it train starts operations over the B&A.

I'm pretty sure that the sole intent of the agreement is to handle traffic for Ayer only and I don't believe that NS will have the ability to do any intermediate work, basically just straight overhead rights.

Exactly
That’s why I’m slightly puzzled as to why none of the operational info in the filings has yet specified how pw gets the auto racks presently dropped by pas at Gardner fir pw.
Do those go west from hill yard, causing the racks to do a day long loop around mt wachusett ? Or continue to come east from mechanicville? I’m waiting for the filings to address this.

I'm not sure if the filings need to address it. This is an operational decision made by NS and P&W. CSX has no need to request the STB to make a decision on this PAS traffic. As mentioned in an earlier post there may be an ED to PW job that avoids the Gardner interchange altogether.

Whether the filing needs to address this or not is beyond my knowledge. Rather, I’m hoping it does as I’m curious

bostontrainguy wrote: ↑Wed Jul 21, 2021 8:13 am Ironically, they recently built a "Train Watching Platform" to bring people to the area to watch all those horrible trains.

https://spotlightnews.com/news/2019/09/ ... m-to-life/

"They" means an Eagle Scout project....probably by a future member of this forum!

Now that's an Eagle project....

(former Scoutmaster)

Sent from my SM-G981U using Tapatalk

F74265A wrote: ↑Thu Jul 22, 2021 4:46 pm Whether the filing needs to address this or not is beyond my knowledge. Rather, I’m hoping it does as I’m curious

As others have mentioned NS will have no rights except straight though to Ayer, therefore the racks will be handled somehow by PAS. Since the B&E operating plan is not within the purview of this transaction you will not see how this will happen spelled out.

Currently, auto racks going to/from P&W at Gardner are handled in NS/PAS carload freights 16R/ED-8 from Binghamton and ED-9/11R to Binghamton. I believe these freights also generally handle Mechanicville racks, too, although there are occasions when 22K/23K move racks to/from Mechanicville. At any rate, I would expect the 16R/ED-8 and ED-9/11R freights to continue hauling racks following CSX acquisition, perhaps with the change to a E Deerfield-Worcester direct move for P&W traffic.

To get on the bandwagon, If NS gets to move Ayer IM on the Boston Line, NS can do away with the $ and time expense of filet/toupee at Mechanicville, not to mention $ and time -- years -- lost in actually dropping the Hoosac for domestic DS.
Continuing the current rack routing is a reasonably efficient operation. The ability to move racks as part as part of IM the Boston Line for Ayer and then move them to/from Gardner for the P&W is an effective hedge for another Hoosac service disruption.

The word is CSX is going to push to have the tunnel cleared for double domestics regardless (for detour purposes.) Even though they want out of PAS they are going to retain the detour agreements with whomever gets their half. As their hand will stretch further into Northern New England the B&M will become more important as a backup route to the B&A.

There is no room in Worcester now with existing traffic, and its not really triple track west of the Worcester yard. It's a controlled siding and main 1&2. to CP46 then main 1&2 to CP48. After that it is single main. The controlled siding is only a bit over a mile long and is used for intermodal car storage during peak season. You can fit maybe, if one of them is small, three trains on main 1 between CP45 and CP48, but it doesn't really matter as the RR is effectively single track from CP45 to CP57 when you do this. Post merger there is no way the current operations will work. Q115 is already dropping excess tonnage out of Worcester in West Springfield.

They are going to have to bring back at least one of the recently abolished trains, Q423 or Q437. My guess is Q437, the train the local job handles since the start of Covid last year. There is no local that goes Worcester to Ayer. That was abolished last year as well. The road crews deal with bringing Q426/Q427 up and down the branch now if they have time or the yard crew does it. They get parked on the branch for crew both ways. Q426 at Burncoat for Pan Am to Ayer, Q427 at New Bond to CSX to either sit in Worcester if the yard crew does it or to Selkirk if it's the road crew.

This knowledgeable report on currently available track capacity strongly supports my outsiders view that more track capacity, plus more crews, likely will be required in Worcester for this to work