INDEPENDENCE, Ohio — Members of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen have ratified a five-year national freight rail contract, the union announced. The contract covers more than 12,000 union members at 10 railroads, including BNSF Railway, Norfolk Southern, and Canadian National’s U.S. operations. Voting concluded today (Dec. 30); vote details were not released. “This […]
OMAHA, Neb. — A Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern merger will lead to higher daily train counts on some key corridors as the railroads tie their networks together, eliminate interchanges, and take shortcuts to avoid Chicago and other gateways. The railroads’ merger application, filed with the Surface Transportation Board on Dec. 19, details projected traffic increases on […]
MEXICO CITY — A government investigation into the cause of Sunday’s fatal derailment of Mexico’s Interoceanic Train has begun, with President Claudia Sheinbaum ordering the federal Attorney General’s Office to lead that inquiry, according to the news site Quinto Poder (Fifth Estate). Thirteen people were killed when the train derailed Sunday morning near Nizanda in […]
LONDON — Rail traffic through the Channel Tunnel connecting England and France has been halted today (Tuesday, Dec. 30) because of a problem with the tunnel’s catenary power system, creating chaos for holiday travelers. A brief notice on the Eurostar website says the tunnel is currently closed, which “means we have no choice but to […]
Nine years after Amtrak inked a $2.45 billion contract with Alstom, builder of France’s TGV, to build 28 trainsets in the U.S., the new equipment debuted on Aug. 27 with a media trip from Washington Union Station to Boston’s South Station. Beginning the next day, the five Next Generation trainsets that had been accepted began […]
WASHINGTON — Union Pacific is disputing Metra’s claim that it “misused confidential communications” in a recent Surface Transportation Board filing in the ongoing fight over the commuter operator’s access to UP’s lines. In a Dec. 24 filing posted to the STB website today (Dec. 29), UP says the material it cited was permissible because it […]
NIZANDA, Mexico — At least 13 people have been killed in a Sunday derailment of Mexico’s Interoceanic train, the two-year-old service across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec launched with a mix of secondhand U.S. and British equipment. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, in a social media post quoting the secretary of the navy, said that 98 people […]
OMAHA, Neb. — While the end-to-end nature of Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern merger limits the amount of redundant trackage or facilities, the railroads do have some duplication of facilities at their current interchange gateways. The merger application submitted to the Surface Transportation Board on Dec. 19 calls for two intermodal terminals and two auto processing facilities […]
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — CSX made headlines in the fall when it completed a pair of massive projects within weeks of each other: The opening of the Howard Street Tunnel in Baltimore after a long-awaited double-stack clearance project, and the rebuilding of the hurricane-damaged Blue Ridge Subdivision in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. CSX shut […]
Blaring locomotive horns announce the presence of four new passenger trains every day at most of the 170 grade crossings on the 144 miles between New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal and a temporary platform at Mobile, Ala. Two daily Amtrak Mardi Gras round trips have been running since Aug. 18, days after throngs turned out […]
While it is impossible to summarize the rail industry’s year in a single article, there were certain key stories and themes worth highlighting. Given the amount of material, let’s get right to it. Some of these stories will be addressed in greater depth in the Top 5 stories of the year countdown that begins Saturday, […]
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Amtrak has turned down a private company’s proposal for a transcontinental passenger train that would have included an auto-carrying feature. WPMT-TV reports that Amtrak said in a statement that it reviewed the proposal from AmeriStarRail and “found it to be lacking a fundamental business case to support its lofty proposal.” Earlier this […]
