Amtrak Crew Practices / Freight Crews

[Tadman]

Over in the Amtrak Fan group at Facebook it was posted that an Amtrak OBS employee at the Salt Lake City crew base tested positive for COVID-19. Apparently everyone in that crew base is now on the 14 day isolation period which leaves no one to run the trains. I'm sure UP turned down a request for crews assuming Amtrak even asked. And of course that would only apply to T&E crews. With no one to man the rest of the trains functions Amtrak had no choice to suspend the train. For now the Denver Zephyr continues to run.

BTW - One thing I remember from my BNSF days handling very late Amtrak trains is that Amtrak's long haul crews bases are not very deep. More then once we had to send a BNSF crew out to drag an Amtrak train to the next crew base. I would look for more segments or perhaps entire routes to be suspended as the virus continues to spread.

This is why I've advocated in the past for going back to using freight crews at Amtrak. Just as our experienced dispatcher says, the back bench is not very deep. Meanwhile, UP probably has hundreds of crews in SLC. They have similar skills and many started in freight. I think they have the same unions. Why draw a line where none exists? Maybe a $X/hour bonus for completing training to run passenger and meeting certain standards?

[bdawe]

This is why I've advocated in the past for going back to using freight crews at Amtrak. Just as our experienced dispatcher says, the back bench is not very deep. Meanwhile, UP probably has hundreds of crews in SLC. They have similar skills and many started in freight. I think they have the same unions. Why draw a line where none exists? Maybe a $X/hour bonus for completing training to run passenger and meeting certain standards?

There's so few passengers anyway that i'd not be surprised if Amtrak just decided not to bother rather than being turned down by UP

[Tadman]

Agreed.

My position is more useful in regular times when there is an accident or force majeure situation like a boulder or flood and they need a few more crews than normal.

Because Amtrak insists on having their own crews, they either must be grossly overstaffed and prepared for hiccups or be right-sized and unprepared for hiccups. Neither is a good position to be in, especially when there are plenty of UTU and BLE folks around the corner. The other attractive item here is that there is more incentive to get an Amtrak train over the line when UP or CSX is paying the hogger by the hour under a fixed contract with Amtrak.

[gokeefe]

Why draw a line where none exists? Maybe a $X/hour bonus for completing training to run passenger and meeting certain standards?

I've been digging a little for the start date of the changeover from host railroad crews to Amtrak crews in order to better inform this post. I believe the date was sometime around 1974 for non-NEC routes. The NEC takeover from Penn Central was 1976. Was also trying to check and see if the Amtrak Improvement Act played a part in this but couldn't find the answer right off.

Setting aside the question of whether or not there should or shouldn't be a separate labor pool at the end of the day it is no more economical for Union Pacific to be able to cover Amtrak than it is for Amtrak to be able to cover their operations. I think that given all the improvements over the past 20 years host railroads now run such tight labor pools that they couldn't have extra crews available without experiencing noticeable additional costs.

[gokeefe]

It is also worth remembering the lessons of the 1960s ... Amtrak is potentially more efficient at covering their own shortages because of the ability of their crews to operate over multiple carriers. This effect isn't seen on the longer segments of the Long Distance transcontinental trains running hundreds of miles over a single carrier but it starts to add up pretty quickly as you get closer to interchange points and denser networks in the midwest or on the coasts.

[Tadman]

Setting aside the question of whether or not there should or shouldn't be a separate labor pool at the end of the day it is no more economical for Union Pacific to be able to cover Amtrak than it is for Amtrak to be able to cover their operations. I think that given all the improvements over the past 20 years host railroads now run such tight labor pools that they couldn't have extra crews available without experiencing noticeable additional costs.

The problem with this analysis is that it lives in a text book, and railroading does not. It asks "if Amtrak's fully burdened labor cost is $100/hour, why would they pay UP $120/hour?"

In the real life picture, there's a grade crossing incident where CofNO hits a car in Jackson, MS, there are no crews available, and the City ties up CN for 6-8 hours, causing 20+ freights to sit for a while. CN probably has 3-5 crews sitting in Jackson, but they "can't drive that train". Nobody wins here. Not CN, not Amtrak, no shippers or passengers, no crew.

Now that train is super late and CN doesnt' care how late it gets, because Amtrak is paying for the crew. This is interesting because CN is well known for using "the passenger main" which is really rusty sidings that are so rusty they have to back out, on account of a switch being removed from service. If there were a fixed price for using CN crews ($X for each run of the train) but CN were paying a hogger to run an Amtrak train hourly, they would be well motivated to move the train over the road better.

Couple market rate trackage rights payments with approved freight crews and you might just have on-time trains again.

[Tadman]

It is also worth remembering the lessons of the 1960s ... Amtrak is potentially more efficient at covering their own shortages because of the ability of their crews to operate over multiple carriers. This effect isn't seen on the longer segments of the Long Distance transcontinental trains running hundreds of miles over a single carrier but it starts to add up pretty quickly as you get closer to interchange points and denser networks in the midwest or on the coasts.

If we're going to get serious about trains being (a) useful, which requires (b) reliability, that means no more trains running over multiple hosts. Statistically speaking, it just invites a whole host of timekeeping snafus. For each host railroad hand-off, we gain another entire class I of problems that can affect timekeeping.

Consider the practical evidence:
Illini to Carbondale - 300-ish miles of potential problems with ramifications from any problems throughout the entire CN system. A problem in South Bend could easily affect Carbondale or Champaign. A problem in Toronto might affect Carbondale. A problem in Vancouver has a slight chance of affecting Carbondale.

City to NOLA - 1000-ish miles of potential problems with ramifications from any problems throughout the entire CN system. A problem in South Bend could easily affect Memphis. A problem in Toronto might affect Memphis. A problem in Vancouver has a slight chance of affecting Memphis.

LSL to New York - 1000-ish miles of potential problems with ramifications from any problems throughout the entire CN system. A problem in South Bend could easily affect Elkhart. A problem in Harrisburg might affect Elkhart. A problem in Roanoke has a slight chance of affecting Elkhart. But you also have the CSX and Metro North to deal with, so to your panorama of probabilities, you're not just adding Albany and Poughkeepsie, but also New Haven, Danbury, Jacksonville, Queensgate, and Louisville.

Some such handoffs are inevitable, like running over MN to access New York. But splitting the CZ into the RGZ and DZ not only takes route miles out of the probability portfolio, it takes entire networks out of the probability portfolio.

Think about it this way - probability is often thought of in terms of geometric growth of problems. Given the current COVID, would you rather be exposed to people from just Denver and Chicago, or Denver, Chicago, Salt Lake, Portland, Seattle, etc... and where did the folks in Seattle go last week?

[gokeefe]

CN probably has 3-5 crews sitting in Jackson, but they "can't drive that train".

I completely agree with the labor per hour analysis. Freight crews are indeed well known to have lower hourly rates of pay. But I do not believe the above quote is true any longer. PSR has almost certainly eliminated most of the slack on the extra boards. In many ways that's the entire point of PSR ... Run on a schedule every time and you'll always be able to reliably plan for labor and won't need the cushion of the extra boards.

I think the idea of minimizing multiple host runs is reasonable to an extent but as you note in most places where it already occurs it's unavoidable.

[rcthompson04]

So how is freight traffic right now? Are they running like trucking and have more freight than they could handle? I suspect that it is more likely that Amtrak would have spare crews.

[bdawe]

Not Super great https://www.aar.org/data-center/rail-traffic-data/

[MACTRAXX]

I've been digging a little for the start date of the changeover from host railroad crews to Amtrak crews in order to better inform this post. I believe the date was sometime around 1974 for non-NEC routes. The NEC takeover from Penn Central was 1976. Was also trying to check and see if the Amtrak Improvement Act played a part in this but couldn't find the answer right off.

GOkeefe: Amtrak Train and Engine Crews in the Northeast Corridor were first
directly employed by Amtrak on January 1, 1983. This was the date in which
Conrail exited passenger service operating contracts along with the beginning of
direct operation of commuter operating authorities: MNCR, NJT, SEPTA and the
short-lived AMDOT (soon to become the MARC Penn Line) Services.

Negotiations between Amtrak and operating railroads were undertaken during
the 1980s to directly employ Train and Engine crews outside the NEC.

Amtrak took direct control of the Northeast Corridor on April 1, 1976 - the same
day that Conrail began service taking over the NEC operations of Penn Central.

For further information check the Amtrak and Conrail RR.net archives along
with the Amtrak Historical Society or the Conrail Historical Society...MACTRAXX

[ThirdRail7]

Allow me to interject with something that I've brought up before.

There is a reason that you see freight operators sliding out of passenger service contracts. I'm not sure if you realize it (even though I've brought it up before)but freight crews can just "operate" passenger trains unless it is an en route emergency. This has been in effect since
CFR Part 242 Conductor Certification was implemented in 2012.

I'll save you the trouble of digesting the entire regulation(even though it is worthy of reading and it may answer why some of your ideas and thoughts aren't allowed) and post the Cliff Notes.


Conductors (and engineers for that matter) must be federally certified and currently, there are two levels of service.


49 CFR § 242.107 - Types of service.:


§ 242.107 Types of service.
(a) Each railroad's program shall state which of the two types of service (conductor and passenger conductor), provided for in paragraph (b) of this section, that it will cover.

(b) A railroad may issue certificates for either of the following types of service:

(1) Conductor; and

(2) Passenger conductor.

(c) A railroad shall not reclassify the certification of any type of certified conductor to a different type of conductor certification during the period in which the certification is otherwise valid except when a conductor completes the emergency training identified in part 239 of this chapter and is certified as a passenger conductor.

(d) Each railroad is authorized to impose additional conditions or operational restrictions on the service a conductor may perform beyond those identified in this section provided those conditions or restrictions are not inconsistent with this part.


As you can see, there is a different definition of the two types of conductor.:

§ 242.7 Definitions.


§ 242.7 Definitions.

Conductor means the crewmember in charge of a “train or yard crew” as defined in part 218 of this chapter. See also the definition of “passenger conductor” in this section.

Passenger conductor means a conductor who has also received emergency preparedness training under part 239 of this chapter. See also the definition of “conductor” in this section.

As such, any freight operator that wanted to have their employees help out Amtrak or provide crews for passenger trains must comply with CFR Part 239 - PASSENGER TRAIN EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS and all of the things that go with it.

As this was the final piece that came out of Chase, the same goes for engineers, a craft that was certified since the 1990s.

Now, imagine giant railroads like UP, CSX, or BNSF putting ALL of their T&E employees in a given area through this training and complying with the regulations for accident simulations on the oft chance they may need to provide passenger service on their dime (unless they put the costs into a service contract...but then they'd still have two pools of workers.) Imagine Amtrak needing to pay for all of the freight employees' qualifications in a given area on the oft chance they may need to provide service.

They've made their decisions.

It is no longer as simple as putting someone in a uniform and handling revenue. Indeed, in an emergency, a freight conductor may only move the train if there is someone on the train that complies with CFR Part 239.

It should be no surprise that when this regulation was almost in play, CSX made a beeline to exit the MARC commuter contract.

[David Benton]

On top of that , you'd want your passenger conductors to be trained to handle passengers somewhat civilly. Not everyone can do it , particularly with difficult/ unruly customers. Plus uniforms etc. So it turns out to be a separate pool anyway .

[RRspatch]

Allow me to interject with something that I've brought up before.

There is a reason that you see freight operators sliding out of passenger service contracts. I'm not sure if you realize it (even though I've brought it up before)but freight crews can just "operate" passenger trains unless it is an en route emergency. This has been in effect since
CFR Part 242 Conductor Certification was implemented in 2012.

I'll save you the trouble of digesting the entire regulation(even though it is worthy of reading and it may answer why some of your ideas and thoughts aren't allowed) and post the Cliff Notes.


Conductors (and engineers for that matter) must be federally certified and currently, there are two levels of service.


49 CFR § 242.107 - Types of service.:

I'll add one thing I'm sure is covered in the "passenger conductor" training is the handling of high voltage electrical cables. I'm of course referring to 480 volt cables between the cars. In BNSF instructions to our crews rescuing Amtrak trains they were instructed that they were to have no contact with the HEP system. If a long distance train developed a fault and needed to be "short looped" the train would run dark until it got to a point where an Amtrak crew could get on. Having to train everyone at a division point on the "passenger conductor" rules and keep them qualified is going to cost MUCH more than Amtrak continuing to use their own crews.

Another thing to consider is the cost savings probably aren't there. Employees of the freight railroads generally earn more than their counterparts at Amtrak. It's like comparing say a dispatcher at Amtrak CETC in Philadelphia to a BNSF dispatcher in Fort Worth .... oh wait .... Also Amtrak has an agreement to run some trains with only one person on the head-end. It remains to be seen if the freight railroads can get the same agreement. In the mean time any Amtrak train would most likely run with two people on the head-end. So, no cost savings there either.

[eolesen]

Decisions aren't always made on a straight labor cost, folks... Metra pays more to have BNSF and UP operate commuter service than they do their own employees.

BNSF, UP, etc. are far better able to bear the cost of things like healthcare and liability. I don't know if Amtrak reaches the level to be able to self-insure, and I'd have to think liability insurance would be lower by using your own folks at the throttle than whatever Amtrak has to pay today.