Empire Builder Timekeeping Struggles

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Interesting article. Sorry he was on one of the very late EBs this Summer. As Fred stated, and most people don't realize, the significant majority of the track on the Hi-Line is single track. Most of Montana is a single track operation, and that is a long distance. Even with adding about 115 miles of double track and extra sidings 3 years ago in MT and ND BNSF is still faced with a growing freight operation that is at or above capacity much of the year. Sure, one solution is for BNSF to double track hundreds of additional miles, which given the wealth of its owner (Berkshire Hathaway) they likely could afford to do so, but those decisions are way above my pay grade and in the hands of people who are looking at the bottom line for their operation and not Amtrak. I do agree with Fred's comment that the BNSF dispatchers generally seem to do a good job giving the EBs priority throughout this trek, but one can only run so many trains so fast on the fixed assets available to them. As my local BNSF contact said and I shared in an earlier post, if they had the capacity, manpower and equipment in place right now, they could do considerably more business than they are currently handling on this route.

Raising the issue of needed maintenance is a good point. Mechanical things break or need regular planned maintenance and Amtrak does not have the rolling assets in place anymore to lose even a few Superliner cars without something being disrupted. No easy answer here at all, sad to say. I just glanced at tonight's "progress" by the EBs along this route and they are right in line with all of our discussions in their delays. #8(23) is almost 5 hours late and 7(23) is 2 1/2 hours late (with the Kootenai Sub still to go thru). Maybe the answer is running the Empire Builder on less than 7 days schedule after all and realistically set a schedule the EB's can make given the current and likely future realities of this route-gosh I would hate to see that happen, but what alternatives does Amtrak and the riding public have at this point?
 
Fred's Column is similar to the one he wrote about VIA and CN after I rode the Canadian with he and about 100+ Railroaders from all over North America on their Annual ride on this Route. ( this was in Febuarary of 2015 and the consist was especially Long due to the various Groups riding. Several of the Crew told us they were glad to get the work since they usually were laid off in the Off-Season)

We were about 10 Hours Late getting into Toronto due to Freight Congestion which has since become much worse on Canada's Northern Transcon.
 
I got to Spokane "only" two hours late this morning. We were about half an hour late out of Williston, but lost over hour and a half between Williston and Wolf Point. From Wolf Point to Spokane, actually gained 10 minutes or so. The dispatching did a tremendous job of getting us through like they did. In a couple of places where there were three tracks, we whizzed right down the middle, with freights on either side of us. Since it was dark by the time we got to Glacier Park, we (my uncle and I) went to bed early. Got a good night's sleep and was wide awake when it was time to leave the train.
 
I just happened to look at when #8 arrived in CHI today-only 9 minutes behind the stretched (ie 1 hour added on for the BNSF track work) schedule. Whoo, Hoo! Hopefully this is a trend. I will ask my BNSF contacts on Monday if the track work is beginning to wrap up as we head into September. I doubt it, but worth an ask.
 
Montana Mike --------- What is going to be interesting is what work BNSF has scheduled next summer season. . If most of the work this season was on single track sections and doubling some of those sections in 2019 would mean much less delays in 2019. Now if the same type work sections next summer ? All those plans are subject to traffic forecasts which seemed to be too low this summer ?
 
montana mike said:
I just happened to look at when #8 arrived in CHI today-only 9 minutes behind the stretched (ie 1 hour added on for the BNSF track work) schedule. Whoo, Hoo! Hopefully this is a trend. I will ask my BNSF contacts on Monday if the track work is beginning to wrap up as we head into September. I doubt it, but worth an ask.
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I’m hoping for a trend as I will be doing a round trip from CHI-SEA September 25-October 2. I have a connection to make from 8 to 370 (Pere Marquette to Holland, MI) which leaves at 6:30. I’m not holding my breath and am very pessimistic about making it.
 
Double tracking between Williston, ND and Havre, and the rest of Havre to Shelby should be a top priority for BNSF if they want a more fluid railroad. Blackfoot, MT to Summit might be more of a challenge because of topography; same for east of Whitefish because of the river. But then you have the Kootenai River Sub to contend with west of Whitefish, and that's going to be real difficult to double. The solution there might be to get the MRL to improve capacity between Sandpoint and Missoula, if that's possible. Their topography isn't much different from BNSF's, though.
 
Bob Dylan said:
Looks like all of the current under way Builders ( Mon 8/27)are in the Green Mike!
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The #8 from 8/25 is still in the red, though only an hour and 15 minutes behind schedule out of MSP. Assuming no further major delays, it should only be a few minutes late into Chicago due to the hour of padding in LSE. Might have been able to make up some more time coming into MSP, but looks like it got stuck behind the Northstar commuter train between Elk River and the Northtown Yard in Minneapolis.

I'm wondering if there was simply a drop of traffic/construction work over the weekend, so things got through more easily? I guess we'll have to wait and see what this week brings!
 
A contributing factor to this weekend's good news was a slow down in the construction effort (some of it due to scheduling, another factor due to materials). The local BNSF guys still say to expect 4-6 more weeks of off and on delays though. I did ask them if any double tracking was in the works for 2019 and they did not have an answer on this. As mentioned in earlier emails, some of the terrain in Western MT and ID can be quite a challenge and very costly to double track. It is somewhat easier to add track on the plains of MT and ND though, but still a costly operation. I will keep pressing them on their long term planning in this regard. I wouldn't hold my breath that any significant additional track is going to be forthcoming soon though.
 
Montana Mike -- Your information about the slow down due to scheduling and lack of materials goes along with what was said earlier that BNSF could not get all the needed materials at last minute ?
 
jebr said:
The Amtrak Empire Builder Facebook group is reporting potential washed out track near Wisconsin Dells. Sounds like there was also a tornado warning through there not too long ag
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I posted this on the facebook group page.

NWS: At 246 PM CDT, a severe thunderstorm capable of producing a tornado

was located 7 miles northeast of Wisconsin Dells, moving east at 35 mph.

They've been going through some awful weather in that area the last few days as this is the second tornado warning in less than 24 hours for WDL. Last night's warning took place after 7 and 8 had passed through.
 
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Good Grief. Another Summer where the EB's can't catch a break. If the reports of a washout in WI are accurate this could really disrupt this route for several days. I see neither train is moving at all.

Meanwhile, the other two Builders are running about 2.5 hours late, but if CP Rail can't fix the reason for the disruption quickly these two trains will also be effected. One would think that once #7 in WI gets going again it will terminate in SPK to try to salvage some sort of semblance of a schedule. I wouldn't be surprised if #8(29) is annulled tomorrow as well.
 
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montana mike said:
Does anyone know what happened to both #7 and #8 in Wisconsin today. They went from on time to both having Service Disruptions.
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Both eastbound (8) and westbound (7) Empire Builders were halted in Wisconsin on the Afternoon of 8/28/2018 following heavy rain, flooding and washed out sections of track. As of 5 AM this morning (8/29/2018) both trains were halted. 8 was later allowed to back up to Mauston. CP reported they hoped to have the track opened again by 8 AM CDT.

News article here:

https://www.channel3000.com/news/amtrak-400-passengers-stopped-on-rails-for-12-hours-due-to-flooding/787738641
 
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I see 8(26) will likely pull into CHI just under 24 hours late, with 8(27) just hours behind! Wow. Meanwhile 7(27) is 18 hours late. I cannot see any train leaving from SEA on any sort of schedule today as well, with tomorrow being even worse. Amtrak is showing that today's #7 will only be 3 hours late leaving CHI. I guess they are going to try to turn around the very, very late #8(26) in only a few hours to get it back on the road some time this evening. So sorry for Amtrak on this mess, the EBs were finally settling into a steady and predictable 2-4 hour delay in their schedule when Mother Nature decided to make things even worse.

Meanwhile my BNSF folks are telling me the Hi-Line is so badly clogged with freight traffic that there is no decent solution this year at all and that if the economy keeps improving (and therefore their freight biz) things will be even worse next year. As I mentioned earlier the BNSF yard in WFH is absolutely jammed with trains at all hours now. BNSF had not planned on any major track additions next year, but now some at the railroad are suggesting that this will be needed to prevent a total mess on the Hi-Line. But many of the choke points are in areas (the mountains for example) that will require significant engineering and design effort that could easily take several years to complete. No quick fixes here.
 
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