79(28) Lost 2H (Again)

So how did 79 of 7/28/2014 manage to loose 2 hours between Richmond and Petersburg?

jb

Storm / storm damage?

CSX track work.

Gee, with delays of that magnitude due to track work, it would be helpful if Amtrak announced it in their Service Disruptions.

Thanks,

jb

I think you said it - perhaps the tracks were loose for the trains to lose 2 hours. Dunno. Wonder if other trains had issues around Richmond and Petersburg yesterday...

VentureForth said:

I think you said it - perhaps the tracks were loose for the trains to lose 2 hours. Dunno. Wonder if other trains had issues around Richmond and Petersburg yesterday...

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From my random checks of the Silvers and the Palmetto at Amtrak status maps, they have often been getting delayed between Staples Mill and Rocky Mount in recent weeks. Yesterday's delays were consistent. The southbound Palmetto #89 (7/28) went from 5 minutes late at RVR to 2:38 late at RMT. The Silver Meteor #97 (7/28) last night went from on-time at RVR to 6 minutes late at PTB to 1:38 late at RMT; the Star #91 (7/28) went from 30 minutes late at RVR to 2:03 late at PTB.

Between the frequent delays in VA and NC and in central Florida over the Sunrail segment, the OTP of the Silvers has continued to be poor. Perhaps the OTP will start to recover by the fall depending on when the CSX track work winds down.

CSX needs to put the second track between RMT and PTB back in place, the one they removed in their enthusiasm for cost saving, even while they were also discontinuing the use of the line via Norlina. There is a reason that it is called the Rocky Mount Gauntlet.

"Rocky Mount Gauntlet". Interesting. I simply refer to it as "the Black Hole".

jb

Looking at all the Silvers currently on Amtrak's Trak-a-Train, it looks like all the loss of time is being generated between Rocky Mount and Richmond.

The gauntlet holds strong.

If CSX doesn't have its management changed, expect the delays and congestion to get worse over time. I've seen what they did to the Water Level Route in NY, where they can't manage to dispatch anywhere near on time over a completely double-tracked railroad.

There is a long term proposal to deal with the segment north of Rocky Mount. It's called SEHSR; bypass everything from Petersburg to Raleigh with passenger-priority tracks.

NCDOT obtained funding for new crossovers between Rocky Mount and Petersburg to improve fluidity of the railroad. CSX has never gotten around to agreeing to install them, or that's what I heard. More crossovers wouldn't be as beneficial for Amtrak timekeeping as restoring more of the second track that was pulled out, but it's a start.

None of us may live long enough to see SEHSR. Waiting for SEHSR to solve this problem is not a good idea.

John Bobinyec said:

"Rocky Mount Gauntlet". Interesting. I simply refer to it as "the Black Hole".

jb

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Appears the Rocky Mount Gautnlet ~2+ hour delay is still in effect for today. Northbound #80 is 2:59 late at PTB, the Silver Star #92 went from on-time at RMT to 2:27 late at RVR.

So, besides the CVS track work, what the heck is the status of the HSIPR grant for 3 crossovers on the CSX A-line? Dead, in limbo, in prolonged negotiation worthy of an international treaty, or inching ahead? As for double tracking from Petersburg to Rocky Mount, wonder how much that would cost CSX since CSX should be able to just restore a second track without the hassle of an EIS, studies, or dealing with federal grants?

Sometimes you can't get a break. NS derailed two cars in Morrisville, NC. That put 76 and 79 right in the dumper.

See here.

jb

The crossovers will be installed but it will take more time (2015 or 2016).

A project to restore all the second track between Petersburg and Rocky Mount would be on the order of $100 million.

jis said:

CSX needs to put the second track between RMT and PTB back in place, the one they removed in their enthusiasm for cost saving, even while they were also discontinuing the use of the line via Norlina. There is a reason that it is called the Rocky Mount Gauntlet.

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Was that a bad business decision on CSX's part? How much (if any) incentive do they get to run Amtrak on time? Just asking...

Until the early 1990s, CSX had 99% double track between Rocky Mount and Petersburg. However, it was signalled for directional running only... in other words, under normal circumstances all northbounds used one track and all southbounds used the other. This was a common practice in railroading prior to the 1950s. The ACL converted most of its main line to "track-and-a-half" CTC starting in the late 1950s, but the segment between Rocky Mount and Petersburg had remained an anachronism. CSX finally got around to the conversion in the early 1990s. By then, all trains that had previously used the S-line (Hamlet-Raleigh-Norlina-Petersburg) had moved onto the A-line.

There's nothing inherently wrong in what CSX did. Thousands of miles of double track directionally ABS-signaled have been converted to track-and-a-half CTC across the nation. Railroads save by having fewer track-miles to maintain. If done right, the conversion can be capacity-neutral. The problem, most people would say, is that this particular conversion removed too much of the second track and also didn't install intermediate crossovers in places where long sections of the second track remained in place. In other words, CSX reduced capacity below what's needed.

I think the fact that CSX did not foresee that people would actually start using freight trains more also played into it. Their mindset was yet to recover from the retrenching psychology of the 70s and 80s that most freight railroads seemed to adhere to. They probably were one of the later recoverers from that mindset, and thus are now stuck with a large bill. So in all fairness, BNSF and UP were alsi caught by surprise when traffic started picking up at a rate they had not anticipated, and had to hustle to double track sections that never were double track to start with and then even go so far as to triple track some sections.

It's actually completely inexcusable for CSX to have maintained the "retrenching" psychology; CSX was a early leader in the massive expansion of intermodal services and knew perfectly well that demand was expanding. A far-seeing management purchased SeaLand in 1986 and was enjoying a booming intermodal business.

Unfortunately, the next management of CSX was grossly incompetent. The same management which single-tracked the section of line we are discussing also sold off SeaLand. CSX has been mismanaged for quite a while now.

...looking at it, I think John Snow got promoted above the level of his competence (Peter Principle). His predecessor Hays Watkins seems to have been a much cannier man. Haven't looked into Ward.

John Snow then proceeded to get promoted further and even higher above his level of incompetence into the federal cabinet as I recall. I agree that John Snow did not seem to have much clue about what he was supposedly managing at CSX.

I am not an apologist for CSX, but be fair. In the late 1980s when the Rocky Mount-Petersburg CTC project was in design, Conrail was still in operation, Potomac Yard was still in operation, Amtrak was not operating the Carolinian (it didn't resume until 1990, and at first it was combined with the Palmetto north of Rocky Mount), etc. The landscape was different then. One could say that the crystal ball at CSX should have been better, but that's hindsight.

Anyway, the NCDOT crossovers will help. Unfortunately I doubt VDOT will spend anything to improve its side of the Rocky Mount-Petersburg black hole. And maybe SEHSR will happen someday... although, SEHSR would create mostly a single-track railroad between Collier Yard and Wake Forest, NC.

xyzzy said:

And maybe SEHSR will happen someday... although, SEHSR would create mostly a single-track railroad between Collier Yard and Wake Forest, NC.

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The fact that it will only carry (mostly) high speed better performance scheduled passenger trains should mitigate the bit about single track specially if it is built with a well placed set of passing sidings. We have seen how well a scheduled single track railroad with well placed passing loops can be run even with 15 minute headway in various places. Once long and unpredictable freights get in the mix it is a completely different story.

CSX will get freight rights over SEHSR. Nobody knows what that will really mean. Even if Petersburg-Norlina-Raleigh is in excellent shape for freight, the Raleigh-Hamlet line is no longer capable of handling more than the Silver Star and local freights.

Hopefully, their access to the line will be rather constrained by virtue of the fact that they will nor be doing the dispatching.

A few freight trains judiciously mixed in more or less on some sort of a schedule should be manageable. But of course the good question is where on earth will they go once they get to Raleigh, unless CSX decides to upgrade the S-Line south of Raleigh. Which if it comes to pass is not going to be a bad thing at all. But in a reasonable world CSX should have to pitch in for the extra long sidings that will be needed on SEHSR, since the only user of those would be CSX.

jis said:

Hopefully, their access to the line will be rather constrained by virtue of the fact that they will nor be doing the dispatching.

A few freight trains judiciously mixed in more or less on some sort of a schedule should be manageable. But of course the good question is where on earth will they go once they get to Raleigh,

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The SEHSR line would be used for *local* freights... so they'd go to the CSX yard in Raleigh. There are no plans to use it routinely for *through* freights (though I'm sure it could be used in emergency reroutes).

CSX didn't make such a big deal of obtaining traffic rights on SEHSR just to push 20 cars a day between Collier Yard and Raleigh (which is a very light traffic origin/destination for freight). They are reserving the right to run significant freight over SEHSR and on to Hamlet without having to run the extra distance via Pembroke. At night? Perhaps.