Opinion

Commentary

Tough Love, Because Competition Beckons

On May 12, IANA (Intermodal Association of North America) offered an interesting look at the North American rail intermodal sector. The webinar featured technical slides shared by Bloomberg Senior Analyst Transportation & Logistics Lee Klaskow and TTX Vice President Fleet Management Company Pat Casey. TTX market development experts John Woodcock and Peter Wolff also participated.

Commentary

“IN PANDEMIC FIGHT, PUBLIC TRANSIT IS PART OF THE SOLUTION, NOT THE PROBLEM”

OK, I’ll give you one guess as to who said this. Hints: It’s not APTA or the Eno Center for Transportation. It’s not one of the giant public transportation agencies like the New York MTA or NJ Transit or CTA or WMATA or Los Angeles Metro. It’s not one of the huge engineering consulting firms like WSP USA, AECOM or Parsons. It’s not a transit car builder like Alstom, Siemens or Bombardier. It’s not even Contributing Editor David Peter Alan, whose passion for rail transit has generated tens of thousands of words for the Railway Age website. Give up?

Commentary

COVID-19 and the Rail Economy

FINANCIAL EDGE, RAILWAY AGE MAY 2020 ISSUE: Too much ink (printer ink in the modern era) has already been spilt trying to find an angle on the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the national and global economy, the consumer, the business segments most impacted by the terrible crisis (think aerospace, restaurants, the arts), the front line healthcare workers risking their lives daily and the retail, delivery and factory workers keeping aspects of life in the United States (e.g. food supply) relatively normal.

Commentary

A Dark and Stormy Night for Labor Talks

WATCHING WASHINGTON, RAILWAY AGE MAY 2020 ISSUE: Into the valley of the shadow of death seem to be marching rail management and labor this round of national wage, benefits and work rules negotiations. Knights of the Round Table—indeed, any table—they are not. So mired are they in the muck of distrust during this COVID-19 crisis, they couldn’t even agree on teleconference negotiations.

Commentary

LiDAR, a Tool for the “Virtual World”

LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), a form of remote sensing, uses laser light pulses to gather information from surfaces in the form of “points” (3D coordinates). The data is processed with point cloud software to form a digital CAD model of the scanned environment. Data gathered during LiDAR surveys and the resulting 3D digital model can be used to analyze current railroad conditions, identify safety risks an dplan the construction of new lines and facilities.

Commentary

Old Enough to Know Better, Young Enough to Care

I confess to being a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to railroads. Not orthodox, not conservative and certainly not rigid, but a traditionalist. For example, I think a railroad line officer is a trainmaster and not a transportation manager, operations services supervisor or anything else. I’m a traditionalist, so I never thought I’d have to argue certain fundamentals. Silly, traditional me.

Commentary

Look to the Future

Nick Little is Director of Railway Education at Michigan State University Broad College of Business Center for Research and Education. Following is a letter he sent to Editor-in-Chief William C. Vantuono in response to the latter’s May 3 editorial, “Leaving Behind Precambrian Attitudes.”

Commentary

Leaving Behind Precambrian Attitudes

During this pandemic, many of us have been thinking about what comes next. What role will railroads, freight and passenger, play in the “new normal,” whatever that might be? There are no clear answers. Or are there? Take a look at what’s happening in India.

Commentary

Remembering Tillie Caileff

Every year just before Christmas, Kansas City Southern runs its Holiday Express train, which in 2019 distributed more than $170,000 to The Salvation Army at 20 stops along its five-state route, providing warm clothing and other necessities for children in need. The train is prepared and staffed by volunteers. On April 13, KCS lost one them with the passing of volunteer Tillie Caileff of Shreveport, La.

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