The April 2023 issue of Railway Age is now available digitally, with a deep dive into the historic combination of Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern, plus an exclusive report from the industry’s thought leaders.
While FreightCar America (FCA) finished “strong” in 2022, ramping up operations in Castaños, Mexico, and delivering 3,184 railcars, the carbuilder in the fourth quarter “continued to experience margin pressure, primarily due to supply chain issues,” President and CEO Jim Meyer said during a March 27 financial report. “These dynamics will be with us through the first quarter of this year, after which we expect to see further improvement in our financial performance.”
San Francisco Bay Area public transit officials consider a “free transfer” pilot. Also, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s (LACMTA) drug-free campaign on three light rail lines is showing promise; and Union Pacific (UP) is transferring its Chicago commuter rail services to Metra.
Norfolk Southern (NS) on March 21 launched the first in a series of safety courses, training more than 400 first responders based in Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
Packwell has broken ground on a new 725,000 square-foot resin packaging facility at Port Houston’s Bayport Industrial Complex in Texas, which is expected to anchor 20,000 export containers annually when it begins operations in early 2024.
In Illinois, 22 port, rail and highway projects will share $200 million in grant funding to address bottlenecks, increase mobility, and improve the supply chain up and down the state, Gov. JB Pritzker, state and local leaders, and the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) reported March 30.
The University of Delaware is seeking presentations for its “Big Data” in Railroad Maintenance Planning 2023 conference, to be held Dec. 13-14, 2023 in Newark, Del.
CN retrofits light trucks to run on propane and gas, as part of its transition plan to a low-carbon economy. Also, Union Pacific (UP) debuts new hazmat-response training railcars built at its De Soto, Mo., shop.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has published the results of its train-to-train impact test evaluating the effectiveness of crash energy management (CEM) components in improving crashworthiness for equipped locomotives in a wide range of potential collisions.
Among the proposals included in the Canadian government’s 2023 budget, tabled March 28 by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland, are those slated to “strengthen Canada’s transportation systems and supply chain infrastructure,” such as the establishment of a Transportation Supply Chain Office and a temporary extension, on a pilot basis, of the interswitching limit in the prairie provinces “to strengthen rail competition.” Also proposed: investing C$210.0 million over five years in VIA Rail Canada.