The 50 shades of vexation venting from self-described captive shippers over delay by the Surface Transportation Board (STB) in considering their petitions to dilute rail regulatory freedoms is matched only by their asserting last year a contradictory 50 shades of encouragement that the Board do just that.
The U.S. Surface Transportation Board has issued a decision determining the railroad industry’s cost of capital for 2016. In Railroad Cost of Capital—2016, Docket No. EP 558 (Sub-No. 20), the Board found that the rail industry’s after-tax cost of capital was 8.88% for 2016. For 2015, the cost of capital was 9.61%.
More than 80% of respondents to a CSX Service Quality survey issued by Cowen and Company say they have experienced service issues since the company initiated President and CEO Hunter Harrison’s Precision Railroading. According to Cowen Managing Director and Railway Age Wall Street Contributing Editor Jason Seidl, “nearly 40% [of respondents] have switched some freight to Norfolk Southern, and 67% have transferred freight to a trucker.”
The Surface Transportation Board Regulatory Reform Task Force (RRTF) will host a public “listening session” (hearing) on July 25, 2017 “to hear stakeholders’ views on streamlining the agency’s regulations.”
As a perfect scene does not a great movie make, ideal legislation cannot deliver its intent absent proficient administration.
On May 1, 2017, Great Lakes Basin Transportation, Inc. (GLBT) filed an application seeking authority from the Surface Transportation Board to construct and operate an approximately 261-mile rail line extending around the Chicago, Ill. area at a distance of 38 to 89 miles from downtown and passing through counties in Wisconsin, Illinois and Indiana. The application, among other items, requested a protective order governing exchange and use of information GLBT deemed confidential.
The Surface Transportation Board announced that it is adopting a tentative new measure of average change in railroad industry productivity for 2011-15.
If Judge Neil Gorsuch is Senate-confirmed to the Supreme Court, federal regulatory agencies such as the Surface Transportation Board (STB) and Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) could be closer to losing a handy, trusted and effective judicial ally in their interpretations of the statutes they administer.
Expediency over principle describes a unanimous vote Jan. 27 by the three Surface Transportation Board (STB) members—Acting Chairman Ann Begeman, a Republican, and Democrats Dan Elliott and Deb Miller.
U.S. Surface Transportation Board Member Ann Begeman on Jan. 25 was named Acting Chairman by President Donald J. Trump. Begeman, a Republican, is currently serving a second, five-year term as an STB Member following her recent nomination by President Barack Obama on Dec. 7, 2016, and her unanimous confirmation by the U.S. Senate on Dec. 9, 2016.
