Today's Headlines Today's HeadlinesPROMONTORY SUMMIT, Utah (AP) -- There's not much at this former railroad depot: a mile or two of track through the windswept desert leading nowhere, a few old locomotives that will never run.
Yet this desolate spot was celebrated 130 years ago as the final link connecting East and West, the starting point for a nation now bound by a ribbon of iron.
It was here that Congress decided the western line laid by the Central Pacific company and the eastern tracks put down by Union Pacific should be linked to make a 1,776-mile rail line.
At 12:47 p.m. today - the exact moment the final spike of gold was driven in May 10, 1869 - a replica was to be hammered into place, celebrating the lost promise of train travel here.
"It was the silliest place to connect the tracks," said Bruce Powell, superintendent of Golden Spike National Park, which stages the annual re-enactment. The decision, he said, was driven by a combination of happenstance and politics.
The two rail companies were racing cross-country, one from San Francisco and the other from the Missouri River, driving their mostly Irish and Chinese workers to lay down track as fast as they could.
Rushing to capture the busy but untapped market in Salt Lake City, the two rail lines actually passed each other in northern Utah, laying almost 200 miles of parallel track as little as 10 feet apart in some spots.
The politicians, fearful of having to subsidize two railroads, stepped in. Congress finally mandated the location where the two rivals should bury the spike.
That spot was Promontory Summit. With both competitors' locomotives facing each other, the final bolt was driven in as the country listened on via the brand-new transcontinental telegraph.
Even then, the area was virtually empty. The tent city the workers built along the track never turned into a real town, the way others did across the West.
A year after the first golden spike ceremony, the central rail connection moved to Ogden, about 45 miles southeast. In 1901, the Central Pacific's main engines were scrapped for iron; Union Pacific's went two years later.
And in 1904, a rail trestle across the end of the Great Salt Lake cut more than 40 miles of the north-south route and made the Promontory Summit line a dead end.
"Things change in the industry," said Powell. "It's been changing for 130 years."
The rail link was completed six years ahead of schedule at an estimated cost of $500 million. Thousands died, although no exact figures were kept.
Today, Amtrak rail passengers make the New York-to-San Francisco run in about 70 hours. In 1869, it took seven days.
When visitors who have come to witness the ceremony today leave here,
however, they won't take the train. The only route home is via the highway.
QUEBEC CITY, Quebec -- Canadian National (CN) will add 400 new center beam flat cars to its lumber car fleet this year at a cost of $35 million, says CN President and Chief Executive Officer Paul M. Tellier.
The new freight cars, along with CN's pending acquisition of Illinois Central Corporation (IC), will enhance CN's ability to provide Canadian lumber producers the right equipment and market reach to tap market opportunities throughout North America, Tellier said.
Tellier, speaking to the Quebec Lumber Manufacturers' annual conference today, said by year-end CN will have spent $125 million over three years to acquire 1,300 new centerbeam cars for lumber producers. The current center-beam fleet consists of 6,600 cars, of which nearly 3,300 are 73 feet in length. CN also has 4,000 box cars equipped to handle lumber products.
Forest products are big business at CN, accounting for 21 per cent of total 1998 revenue. Lumber is the largest revenue producer among forest products hauled by CN, making up 40 per cent of all forest products revenue.
Tellier said CN's acquisition of IC, and existing marketing alliance with IC and Kansas City Southern Railway Company, will create new market opportunities for Canadian lumber producers by providing them with efficient, single-line service to the major markets of St. Louis, Mo., Omaha, Neb., Memphis, Tenn., and New Orleans, La. The merger will also benefit shippers by avoiding congestion in Chicago, the rail hub of North America.
The CN/IC merger, linking the two railroads end-to-end in Chicago, will create the only true North American railroad, one well-positioned to reap the benefits of rising Canada-U.S. trade flows that are growing at about 11 per cent annually.
Tellier said the CN/IC will not only expand lumber producers' markets, but also protect their existing ones.
"The consolidation of the big American railroads has given their customers new competitive options - options that have an impact on the traditional markets for Quebec forest products," he said. "Our added size and reach will make the American railroads negotiate seriously with us when we want competitive access for our customers to those markets."
Tellier said shippers will benefit from carefully-planned, step-by-step integration of CN and IC starting July 1 that will make safety and continuity of service top priorities.
Shipper benefits will also accrue from CN's new corporate structure, which is designed to focus operations and marketing squarely on customer needs and growth while securing the efficiencies of the CN/IC merger, he said.
The new organization, including the establishment of five geographic divisions, will produce a strong, North American network benefiting from centralized strategic leadership and standards and economies of scale. At the same time it will empower field-level managers and new divisional sales forces, giving them greater autonomy to serve shippers and to respond to local market opportunities.
Finally, shippers will benefit from CN's comprehensive service plan introduced last fall, Tellier said.
"Our service is now built around operating procedures that run trains on optimum schedules with only minimal variance to the day-to-day plan," he said. "Cars have precise schedules, stated in hours, rather than days. Our goal is run a railroad with the efficiency and reliability of a conveyor belt."
Canadian National Railway Company serves all of Canada and the U.S. Midwest,
including the ports of Vancouver, Montreal and Halifax, and the key cities
of Toronto, Chicago, Detroit and Buffalo, with connections to all points
in North America.
PITTSBURGH, May 10 -- Bay State Transit Services LLC has been selected by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) to negotiate a five-year contract, not to exceed $175 million, to provide rail equipment maintenance for MBTA's commuter rail line in Boston.
Bay State Transit is a joint venture of Boise Locomotive Co. and Herzog Transit Services Inc. Boise Locomotive, a subsidiary of MotivePower Industries, Inc., owns 75 percent of the joint venture company.
MBTA selected Bay State Transit from a field of four candidates after evaluating technical and financial proposals. The selection means that officials of Bay State Transit and MBTA can begin to negotiate the proposed five-year contract, under which Bay State Transit would provide daily equipment maintenance on 83 locomotives and 363 passenger coaches. Bay State Transit is scheduled to begin the work in the fourth quarter, subject to contract negotiating and signing.
Combined, Bay State Transit's principals have extensive experience in maintaining railroad equipment and infrastructure, with more than 750 pieces of equipment, 400 miles of track and 16 locations under contract throughout North America.
"The talent and experience of the Bay State Transit team will enable us to provide safe, reliable and comfortable equipment for MBTA's commuter rail customers," said Joseph S. Crawford Jr., chief operating officer of MotivePower Industries. Crawford has 35 years of rail industry experience, including eight years as chief mechanical officer of Amtrak and six years as vice president and general manager of New Jersey Transit Rail Corp.
"Our experience will also help to ensure a smooth transition from the current maintenance provider, Amtrak, to Bay State Transit," Crawford continued. "In addition, we believe Amtrak's current employees at this operation are a key element to our future success, and we look forward to working with this talented work force to meet and exceed MBTA's performance objectives."
Boise Locomotive specializes in maintaining rail equipment, overhauling older locomotives and building new, low-horsepower locomotives for commuter and freight applications. Amtrak recently awarded Boise Locomotive a two-year extension of a contract to provide maintenance services on locomotives and passenger cars for the Coaster, a commuter rail service that operates in California between San Diego and Oceanside.
Independently or through affiliates, Boise Locomotive currently manages nine rail equipment maintenance contracts and more than 700 pieces of rolling stock at 13 locations throughout North America. The company has extensive experience with MBTA's current locomotive fleet, having manufactured 12 of the units; and other subsidiaries of MotivePower Industries manufacture locomotive components for MBTA. Boise Locomotive has also built locomotives for various commuter rail lines in Connecticut, Maryland, Florida and California.
Herzog Transit Services, a subsidiary of Herzog Contracting Corp., specializes in managing the transportation and maintenance of commuter rail operations. Herzog Transit currently manages three commuter operations in the U.S.: TriRail in Miami, Trinity Rail Express in Dallas, and the Altamont Commuter Express in Stockton, Calif. Herzog Transit also maintains 400 miles of track on 280 miles of right of way for Metrolink, Southern California's commuter rail system. In each of these commuter operations, the company competed successfully against Amtrak for the projects.
"Together, Boise Locomotive and Herzog have a proven track record of successfully starting new rail maintenance projects and managing a smooth transition from previous maintenance providers and their employees," said Stan Herzog, president of Herzog Contracting. "We look forward to a similar smooth transition and many years of excellent performance for Boston-area commuters."
MotivePower Industries (www.motivepower.com) is a leader in the manufacturing of products for rail and other power-related industries. Through its subsidiaries, the company manufactures and distributes engineered locomotive components; provides locomotive and freight car fleet maintenance; overhauls locomotives, freight cars and diesel engines; manufactures new, environmentally friendly, switcher, commuter and mid-range locomotives up to 4,000 horsepower; and manufactures components for power, marine and industrial markets.
RALEIGH (AP) -- It cost a traveler $38 to ride The Piedmont, a state-owned passenger train, from Raleigh to Charlotte and back in 1997.
Taxpayers picked up the rest of the tab -- $75.87, state auditors say.
But at least there weren't many passengers.
An audit report released last week showed that The Piedmont, which runs from Raleigh to Charlotte, had an average daily ridership of just 106 passengers.
Its sister train, The Carolinian, which runs from Charlotte to Raleigh, carried an average of 467 passengers each day. While Carolinian passengers paid the same ticket price as Piedmont passengers, the state subsidy was only $10.39 per rider.
Legislators and the Department of Transportation "should critically examine the public need versus the cost and frequency of service provided," the auditors urged.
David King, who heads DOT's rail division, said there is no doubt in his mind the taxpayers' investment in passenger trains is worthwhile.
"If you consider I-40 and I-85 from Raleigh to Charlotte as one continuous road, the growth rate of that road in general is between 6 and 7 percent a year," King said. "That means traffic on that stretch is doubling every 10 1/2 years."
"We've got a multi-billion dollar investment in that road," King said. "It's the heart of commerce in North Carolina, and we can't replicate it in 10 years."
The taxpayer subsidies for passenger trains, he said, are comparable to those for airlines. While private airline companies turn profits, they depend on a government-financed air traffic control system and airports to operate.
The state got into the passenger train business in 1990 with The Carolinian. The train operated as part of the Amtrak system from New York to Florida.
In 1995, The Piedmont was added by the state to allow same-day, round-trip service between Charlotte and Raleigh.
The number of riders on both trains has been growing by double-digits over the last couple of years.
"The progress that we've made has been made with very little discernible improvement to the customer," King said.
The 3-hour-and-45-minute ride from Raleigh to Charlotte, nearly an hour longer than the same trip by car, is "enjoyable, but frustrating if you're time-sensitive," King said.
Speed is what customers want, "and we have done nothing for our customer in that area over the last five years."
Within three or four years, King said, the state hopes to cut the train time for the trip to two hours and 50 minutes, comparable to cars.
The state owns the tracks from Charlotte through Raleigh to Morehead City, but negotiations with Norfolk Southern Railroad for a new lease on the line has taken years.
The outlines of a new lease were announced two weeks ago.
With a new lease, and full state ownership of the rail line for the first time since it was created 100 years ago, the state can begin making real improvements that should make passenger trains more attractive, King said.
"We have got a product," he said. "If we can only improve it a little, the customer will beat a path to our door."
Sam Hunt, president of the North Carolina Railroad, said accommodating both passenger trains and freight trains as well as local transit that some areas want will require the single track to be expanded to two tracks.
"If you're not going to go out there and double-track that line, we're not going to improve service," Hunt said. "And the only way to double-track is to spend $200 (million) to $300 million."
"The railroad company now has some right-of-way and the tracks that can be improved," he said. "But if we're not going to improve what we have, if we're not going to make the investment, then it's never going to get any better."
The average train speed is 45 mph on the Raleigh-to-Charlotte route, Hunt said. To be competitive with cars, the average speed needs to get up to 65 mph, which requires millions of dollars of track improvements.
"We will have to do that little by little," he said. "Where are we going to put the first $25 million to make a difference, a real difference in the service? Until now (with full state ownership of the railroad), we didn't even have the right to do that."
With the railroad, it's more important to focus on the future than the present, Hunt said.
"It's unfair to be too critical, and it's unrealistic to expect too much too quick," he said.
WASHINGTON -- Government safety watchdogs are beginning to pay special attention to workplaces with above-average rates of injury and illness.
Nearly 12,500 employers have been sent letters asking them to make job sites safer. The largest number of those notices went to nursing homes, trucking companies and warehouses -- places where heavy lifting is required.
"These employers must do better," Labor Secretary Alexis Herman said. "Workers should not have to risk serious injury or illness or their lives for their livelihood."
"It surprises a lot of people that nursing home work is one of the most dangerous occupations in America - more dangerous than working in a coal mine or a steel mill," said Andrew L. Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union.
The companies that got the largest number of the special notifications recently from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration said they've been improving workplace safety for years, and noted they were targeted based on 1997 data.
"That was two years ago," said Dan Springer, vice president of public relations for Beverly Enterprises Inc., an Arkansas-based nursing home chain. "Over the course of the last couple years, recognizing the strain that is inherent in our business ... we've taken action to mitigate workplace injury."
"Roughly three-quarters of the injuries, and probably more, that take place in a nursing home relative to workers' compensation, are back-related and that's due to the lifting of residents, primarily," Springer said. He said the company has invested $15 million in mechanical lifts.
The company also has spent $5 million on training in the proper techniques for lifting patients who are unable to get out of a bed or chair unassisted.
United Parcel Service, which joined Beverly at the top of the list of companies receiving multiple OSHA notices, has spent nearly $1 billion since 1995 on improving health and safety programs, said spokesman Tom Walsh.
Days lost to disability have been on the decline at UPS, Walsh said, dropping by 7.5 percent in the first quarter of this year. He attributed that to a recent company effort to work with its unions to encourage safer work methods and habits.
The Teamsters union, which opposes UPS positions on the need for new safety standards, gives the company credit for recent efforts to make workplaces safer. "I do see some positive things that they're doing," said Lamont Byrd, the union's director of safety and health.
The OSHA notification letters, mailed in late April, were the result of answers to a mandatory 1997 survey of workplaces. Sites were selected for the special letters based on the number of employee days reported lost to work-related illness or injury. The construction industry, which accounts for nearly half of all OSHA inspections, was exempted because of the temporary nature of its work sites.
The program is OSHA's most extensive effort to reduce workplace hazards since a federal appeals court blocked the use of the agency's cooperative compliance program, under which employers with the highest injury rates could reduce their odds of being inspected by voluntarily adopting a safety program.
The appeals court agreed with business groups who argued that the compliance program was coercive. OSHA has not decided whether to appeal that ruling, but in the new round of notifications it struck a far more conciliatory tone.
"OSHA recognizes that an elevated lost workday illness and injury
rate does not necessarily indicate a lack of interest in safety and health
on the part of your business," its letter said.
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