Metra revamps bicycle policy

Chicagoland’s Metra announced Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2014 that it is revising its “Bikes on Trains” policy to replace bans during exceptionally busy periods with “warning dates,” in which bicycles will be allowed but owners will be cautioned that crowded conditions could prevent Metra from accommodating an initial or return trip.

For FEC, intermodal expansion

Florida East Coast Railway (FECR) is increasing its intermodal capacity by adding new equipment, and is expanding its services to include intermodal transportation between Charlotte, N.C., and a number of locations in South Florida.
Commentary

Senate odd fellows unite to pack STB

An Iraqi proverb reads, “Show them death and they will accept a fever.”

CN again named to Dow Jones Sustainability World Index

CN’s sustainability practices have earned it a place on the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index (DJSI) for the third consecutive year that the railroad has been listed on the DJSI World Index, and for the sixth consecutive year that it has been listed on the DJSI North America Index.

Eliasson: “CSX well-positioned for growth”

“As global freight demand increases and American highways remain overcrowded and underfunded, CSX is building on a proven track record of success for shareholders by capitalizing on growth opportunities across nearly all of our markets,” Chief Financial Officer Fredrik Eliasson told investors and analysts Sept. 11, 2014 at the UBS Best of Americas conference in London.

CSX launches Operation Respond

As part of an ongoing focus on community emergency preparedness and training, CSX is introducing “CSX Operation Respond,” a new mobile information system that it says “will enhance first responders’ ability to access train and cargo information in real time via their mobile devices.”

Integrate Greater Toronto transit, group urges

The Greater Toronto Area must merge its public transit properties into a cohesive, unified whole, the CEO of the Toronto Region Board of Trade has declared.

Commentary

Rockefeller’s last stand; RSIA Déjà vu, Volume Two; PRIIA Redux

Congress is about to adjourn for its single-most-important function these days as mid-term elections loom: getting re-elected. That means it’s time to get down to some serious last-minute, constituent-coddling activities, like proposing legislation beating down the big, bad, monopolistic freight railroads, which, along with their passenger-carrying counterparts, are fundamentally unsafe and need to be policed, constantly, and—yet again—reforming Amtrak.

One-person crew proposal rejected on BNSF

BNSF Railway conductors and ground-service workers represented by General Committee GO-001 of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air and Rail Transportation Workers (SMART, formerly the United Transportation Union) have rejected a proposal to allow freight trains equipped with Positive Train Control (PTC) to operate as early as next year with a lone engineer in the cab and no conventional on-board conductor between specific territories in the Midwest and Pacific Northwest.

Cowen & Co.: “Rail outlook remains positive”

The freight transportation outlook from Cowen & Co.’s 7th Annual Transportation Conference is positive, with railroads benefitting from growth in a broad range of markets, according to Managing Director and Railway Age Wall Street Contributing Editor Jason Seidl.
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