For NS, a few steps to self improvement
An initiative launched in the third quarter, Track 2012 sets specific goals for improving safety, operational and financial performance. The initiative will be the “focal point for our company to continuously improve over the next five years,” said NS Chairman, President and CEO Wick Moorman in June while addressing the Merrill Lynch Global Transportation Conference in New York City.
The railroad plans to meet or exceed “aggressive” targets for a number of key service metrics by the end of 2012, not the least of which is fuel efficiency. NS consumes 1.4 million gallons of diesel per day, or about 500 million gallons annually. Finding ways to save one cent per gallon can cut annual fuel costs by $5 million.
One implement in Track 2012’s fuel-efficiency toolbox is the Wireless Event Recorder Information System (WERIS). Installed on about 1,600 locomotives, the system wirelessly downloads information from event recorders at various access points across NS’ system. A mechanical department team analyzes the data to identify train crews’ fuel-conserving strengths and weaknesses, and determine ways to further reduce diesel usage.
“We are working to ensure that our crews will receive feedback based on the data that can help them improve their fuel conservation and train-handling techniques,” said team leader and Manager of Train Operating Practices Brian Keller in the October issue of NS’ monthly newsletter.
The team plans to recognize top train-handling performers, who will serve as role models for others. NS expects to equip more locomotives with WERIS during the next few years.
In the meantime, the Class I is rolling out InnovatioNS, an initiative aimed at encouraging workers to come up with new operational-improvement ideas. Here are a couple of recent ones from crew management employees: provide a volunteer crew management center (CMC) mentor for each new hire and update all 11 operating divisions’ CMC guidebooks.
“Employees at all levels and locations [can] find creative ways, big and small, to improve the company,” said Moorman.
With Track 2012 and InnovatioNS, Norfolk Southerners believe they’ll leave no large or tiny stone unturned — and avoid any wrong turns — on the road to self improvement.
Posted by: 
Jeff Stagl | Date posted: 10/8/2008
Comments
Posted by Bill on 10/13/2008 1:09:28 PM
Fuel conservation is important. However, some railroads have implemented conservation programs that focus so much on the most fuel conserving methods of train handling that they put trains at risk of overspeed past signals and the possibility of failing to stop at the appropriate location. Throttle modulation and dynamic braking are good, but only when they are effective for controlling train speeds.
Posted by Bruce Gillings on 10/17/2008 12:04:06 PM
Cost controls are necessary and deserve a high priority. But, as a member of the "other side" (I design industrial facilities) the mantra I keep hearing is: when will the railroads get their service to quality levels. That means that whether it is intermodal or carload, shipments need to scheduled and the schedules met with very limited exceptions. That is not what today's railroads are delivering. There is still a significant gap between what businesses need and railroads are providing. That gap needs more than catchy, motivational phrases: it needs to be addressed through performance, period.
Posted by Larry Kaufman on 10/17/2008 3:27:04 PM
Bruce Gillings is right about what railroad service should be like. I believe he is wrong when he states that rail service is not good. Every railroad of which I am aware measures its performance in terms of how well each carload hits the specifications - plus or minus so many hours from schedule. Is it perfect? Of course not. Will it ever be? Probably not. But perfection is a goal worth striving for. As a journalist over many years, I have come to know that many rail shippers will tell reporters how bad it is, but only if they are granted anonymity. There's a reason why most new organizations have policies against using anonymous sources and for explaining to readers when they do why a source is not identified. In this case, precision operations are more profitable operations requiring fewer locomotives, fewer train crews, etc. The suggestion from Mr. Gillings that rail service is poor and that management doesn't care is just plain wrong.
Posted by Bruce Gillings on 10/17/2008 4:44:07 PM
I don't mean to imply that rail management does not care; I am sure they do and the management people I have met in operations seem that way (in industrial development it is a different story - it is a "this is the way we do it" attitude). But in operations, I have to stand by what I said. I have two projects underway now that involve major shippers, both involving perishable products. For one, they have tried both intermodal and carload. In neither case is the service reliable: on-time ratios are unacceptable to the level where only products with long shelf lifes are shipped, and deliveries can be on time for a while, then late by days or a week. There is always a "good" reason to the railroad, but ulmately a shipper does not care if the reefer was bad-ordered or there was a derailment so all trains were delayed for three days: bottom line is the shipment was late and my client is put in a position of missing a delivery date. My second case client has given up on intermodal, in spite of fuel costs, because his shipments kept getting bumped, missing hot connections, and he was getting perishable trailers delivered two, three or four days late. Produce doesn't look good on a supermarket shelf when it is already aging. That will take a paradigm shift in the industry of recognizing that schedules must be met, not just a goal. Again, I don't think the problem is whether or not management cares, but it is a challenge for railroads to move into a new world of service and operations delivery where service interruptions - defined as any event that interferes with a delivery schedule - are the exception, not the norm. That is not the case now.
Posted by Larry Kaufman on 10/20/2008 10:40:03 AM
I don't dispute what Mr. Gillings says about his two clients and their unhappy experience with rail service. There are at least two solutions to the service problems his clients have encountered. One, negotiate a contract that covers rates and minimum service standards, with reparations paid by the railroad for any failures under that contracts. Second, if the railroad refuses to sign such a contract and accept real service standards, pay the freight, so to speak, and ship the goods by truck using team drivers. It may cost more money, but the perishables won't look aged on the shelf. I'm not trying to make light of Mr. Gillings' clients problems, but I'm unaware of any requirement that railroads disrupt their service as common carriers in the interest of satisfying one or a few customers. Some of us remember when UP guaranteed a maximum time of transit for UPS containers. It wasn't long before UP determined that it couldn't meet the contract terms to which it had agreed and ended up paying UPS to take its traffic off its rail system and put it on the highway - or back on BNSF, which was able to provide that level of service. Until shipments are made in one car behind one locomotive, the demands of some shippers - probably including Mr. Gillings' clients - will be impossible to meet.
Posted by James Swidergal on 10/23/2008 4:00:50 PM
If the NS wanted to take steps to self improvement, they should have hired me,at least I have experience.
Posted by An Ex-Con(railer) on 10/29/2008 2:09:03 PM
It is a little early yet to determine if the current chapter in self improvement will work out exactly as Wick Mooreman envisions. Somehow, though, I think that it might surprise him, because railroaders often take the position of "Chief, point us to where you want us to go, then watch us get there. But, pardon the smoke." Then we sometimes just start up again and go to the next three stations beyond the original destination on down the line. That said, improvement is something that has always been sought since I started with Penn Central well over 30 years ago. At NS safety is always a prime concern. "It is not worth it if someone gets hurt" is taken to heart. We want everyone to go home the same way they arrived at the start of the day, except maybe a bit tired. This is right, this is appropriate, this is key to improving. Actually this also dates back to Penn Central. We just know more about how to accomplish it now. 30 years experience teaches something, I guess. But everyone needs to remember, the purpose of a corporattion is to earn money for its investors. That is why corporations are created. If you cannot make money in a given business, find one that you can make money in or get out of business altogether. Improvement in business is doing the things that make money and doing them more efficiently. The Union Pacific got out of the priority train for UPS business because they could not provide the desired level of service without spending too much to deliver it. Unfortunately, safety also enters into this calculation. Lack of safety is costly. It disrupts things. It keeps people from doing what they must do to serve the customer efficiently. If giving a produce customer the level of service that a trucker delivers costs us more than it does the trucker, then it improves the process to give the business to the trucker. Service improvement involves learning how to give that service at a cost less than the trucker incurs if that is possible. By the way, volume counts too, if we can gain 52 unit train moves of coal (15,000 tons per train) on which we make $5 a ton or can gain one 35 ton move of produce on which we can make $6 a ton, where would the sane manager be expected to devote his efforts? (That is $3,900,000 earned versus $210, for those who need help with the math.)
Posted by Max Mitchell on 11/13/2008 5:59:23 PM
I watched the first episode of "Extreme Trains" on November 11 and was very pleased to see that it included material about more than just the train operations. So many "Train" or "Railroad" programs don't even mention the track and structures OR mechanical maintenance issues. It was refreshing to see this included even though not to the extent I would have preferred.
