More Wednesday morning rail news: MBTA plans one-week furloughs for executives, union members to help address budget shortfall The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority is planning one-week furloughs for some executives and union members as part of its effort to address the budget shortfall created by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Boston Herald reports that MBTA General […]
Wednesday morning rail news: Lineage buys refrigerator car firm Cyro-Trans in $500 million deal Cold-storage specialist Lineage Logistics announced it is purchasing Cryo-Trans, which has more than 2,200 refrigerated and insulated railcars, North America’s largest privately owned fleet, and manages more than 40,000 annual rail shipments. Lineage, a real estate investment trust based in Novi., […]
ATLANTA — The pandemic hurt railroad traffic across the board, but none more than Norfolk Southern. NS volume for 2020 was down nearly 12%, which was twice as much as Eastern rival CSX Transportation and considerably deeper than the industry average of a 7% decline [see “Canadian Pacific leads industry volume for second straight year,” Trains News Wire, […]
Tuesday afternoon rail news: STB says transportation aspects of Uinta Basin rail line meet requirements for exemption The transportation aspects of Utah’s Uinta Basin Railway meet the statutory requirement for an exemption allowing construction and operation of the approximately 85-mile line, the Surface Transportation Board has ruled. The ruling, decided Monday and issued today, does […]
Tuesday afternoon rail news: STB says transportation aspects of Uinta Basin rail line meet requirements for exemption The transportation aspects of Utah’s Uinta Basin Railway meet the statutory requirement for an exemption allowing construction and operation of the approximately 85-mile line, the Surface Transportation Board has ruled. The ruling, decided Monday and issued today, does […]
More Tuesday morning rail news: Effort to reduce wildlife deaths along rail line in Canadian park shows promising results A pilot project to reduce wildlife deaths along Canadian Pacific’s route through Banff National Park is showing promising results two years into a five-year project. The CBC reports the project, which cut 38 kilometers (23.6 miles) […]
Tuesday morning rail news: MassDOT narrows East-West options to three, sees funding challenges The three final alternatives for the proposed East-West rail project connecting Boston and Pittsfield, Mass., would cost between $2.4 billion and $4.6 billion, but will face hurdles in qualifying for federal funding, according to a report released Monday by the Massachusetts Department […]
FORT WORTH, Texas — BNSF Railway has begun testing Wabtec’s battery electric FLXdrive locomotive in revenue service between Barstow and Stockton, Calif. The red and gray FLXdrive locomotive, Wabtec 3000, is spliced between a pair of conventional Wabtec Tier 4 locomotives for pilot runs that will extend through March. The first train out of Barstow […]
Canadian Pacific and Canadian National have welcomed the new year by announcing the latest in an ongoing string of records for Canadian grain movement. Canadian Pacific closed out 2020 by setting records in a calendar year, quarter, and the month of December. The railroad moved 31.32 million metric tons of grain in 2020, with 8.84 […]
In a year when all of the big Class I railroads lost volume due to the economic impact of the pandemic, Canadian Pacific came out on top. CP’s volume declined 2.2% in 2020, well above the average 6.8% decline of the big six systems, according to a Trains News Wire review of the railroads’ weekly […]
More Monday morning rail news: Sounder North service cancelled after mudslide Sound Transit’s Sounder North commuter service has been cancelled for today after heavy rains led to a mudslide on Saturday between the Mukilteo and Edmonds stations. Operational protocols on the line call for passenger service to be halted for at least 48 hours following […]
By: Steve Smedley TREGO, Wis. — As winter holds an icy grip on Northwestern Wisconsin, the restoration of the Wisconsin Great Northern Railroad’s Mark Twain Zephyr continues. One of nine Zephyrs built by the Budd Co. for the Chicago Burlington & Quincy Railroad, the Wisconsin Great Northern acquired the train last year and is restoring […]
