CSX Pares Precision RR Network down to 5 Regions

[johnpbarlow]

CSX CFO Frank Lonegro is presenting today at Cowen and Company’s 10th Annual Global Transportation Conference, painting a rosy high level picture that progress is being made morphing CSX to a Precision Railroading and tumult is receding. Here's a URL to his presnetation:

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/External.Fi ... U9MQ==&t=1

I thought this slide depicting the reduction of regions from 9 to 5 was interesting in that CSX New England ops are part of the mid-Atlantic lines from Selkirk south to Virginia, the Carolinas, eastern Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and W Va. I would have thought CSX New England traffic would more naturally fit with the Chicago line ops west of Selkirk.

[mmi16]

CSX CFO Frank Lonegro is presenting today at Cowen and Company’s 10th Annual Global Transportation Conference, painting a rosy high level picture that progress is being made morphing CSX to a Precision Railroading and tumult is receding. Here's a URL to his presnetation:

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/External.Fi ... U9MQ==&t=1

I thought this slide depicting the reduction of regions from 9 to 5 was interesting in that CSX New England ops are part of the mid-Atlantic lines from Selkirk south to Virginia, the Carolinas, eastern Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and W Va. I would have thought CSX New England traffic would more naturally fit with the Chicago line ops west of Selkirk.

Promotes real 'hands on' supervision of the regions - Boston/Selkirk to Charleston, SC; Chicago to Waycross, GA. [/sarcasm] The others seem to be semi-manageable.

[QB 52.32]

I thought this slide depicting the reduction of regions from 9 to 5 was interesting in that CSX New England ops are part of the mid-Atlantic lines from Selkirk south to Virginia, the Carolinas, eastern Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and W Va. I would have thought CSX New England traffic would more naturally fit with the Chicago line ops west of Selkirk.

The same could be said about the River Subdivision from Selkirk to North Jersey.

[ccutler]

It seems as if the yellow lines are the high-speed, high-density lines built for a very low operating ratio, and the purple lines have high operational complexity and a higher operating ratio. That line of thinking would keep the B&A route in the purple region, even though operationally it has more to do with the yellow region.
This sort of management plan suggests that the true operational talent gets the burden to run the purple region, while the brown-nosers closest to the activist investor and EHH get to take the financial rewards for running the low operating ratio of the yellow region. Please excuse the sarcasm

[mmi16]

Made a visit to the Baltimore Dispatching center. The ranking official on the Operating side of the operation is the non-contract Chief Dispatcher. There is no Division Manager, Asst. Division Manager, Superintendent of Operations, Directors of Train Operations - all positions eliminated - some 'promoted', some returned to craft positions, some terminated. Road Foreman of Engines positions have been eliminated - who will qualify and re-qualify Engineers as required by FRA Regulations has not been addressed. New Employee Timetables were issued effective September 1, 2016. Instead of being issued for a operating Division, each Sub-Division has its own timetable - 30 separate timetables. None of the timetables name any supervisor for the territory beyond the Train Dispatcher that runs the sub-division.

In talking with the Dispatcher, who will be headed to Jacksonville approximately September 17 (Irma willing) they were complaining about the rapid fire nature that the changes of the operating plan came down, came down without ANY plan how the changes were to be implemented.

What it appears EHH has done in sweeping away echelons of middle management is force 'Generals' to implement their 'grand plan' strategies in dealing with Platoon level managers. Generals and Platoon leaders talk different languages and see different views of the job to be performed. If the Platoon leader leads his platoon operations from the viewpoint of the General - the platoon could easily be annihilated. Differing levels of management look after different problems that must be solved for the successful performance of the entire organization.

Where is all this headed???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????