CSX's '09 agenda includes ONE Plan overhaul
Now, the One Plan — which CSX has continued to tweak along the way — is due for an overhaul to “squeeze out a few more trains” from the network, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Tony Ingram told me during a visit to the Class I’s Jacksonville, Fla., headquarters last month.
“We have a good model and a good handle on our traffic base,” he said. “We need to revamp the plan and reset it.”
The changes will help CSX improve customer service and reduce operating costs by consolidating more trains, which will cut fuel usage; further minimize terminal handlings; and prevent train stops and transit delays.
The railroad currently is developing a new traffic forecasting strategy, and analyzing and refining data to “work out impediments for O-D pairs,” says Ingram.
“We’re trying to determine what traffic to use for the plan – from the past 30 days or what is forecasted?” he says.
CSX expects to have “good, critical numbers” by the end of the first quarter, says Ingram. For example, the revamped plan will enable the railroad to optimize traffic flows at a Cincinnati yard by programming the software to recognize the facility optimally can handle 4,000 cars while 5,000 would be too many.
The timing is right for the revision because traffic is lighter and the plan now can incorporate new federal rules governing hazardous materials shipments. In addition, the railroad has new resources (including locomotives), more capacity and historical traffic data that’s been gathered since the plan’s roll out.
Plus, traffic managers are more educated about and comfortable with the plan than they were in 2004, says Ingram.
“We better positioned now than we were four years ago,” he says. “We have better discipline in the field.”
CSX also has a better-than-average chance of advancing its National Gateway double-stack corridor between three mid-Atlantic ports and the Midwest — but for more on that, you’ll have to wait until mid-January, when my cover story on the subject comes out in the next issue. In the meantime, happy holidays.
Posted by: 
Jeff Stagl | Date posted: 12/19/2008
Comments
Posted by John Licht on 12/22/2008 1:00:28 PM
Now is the ideal time to implement infrastructure and equipment upgrades requirements (Train Control, Air Brakes & Tank Car Vessel Tests). Last minutes deadlines always seem to arrive before we are ready.
Posted by michael willis on 12/28/2008 3:05:42 PM
2009 INAUGURATION TRAIN TO ARRIVE IN WASHINGTON DC!: President-elect Obama & family will depart Philadelphia and proceed to Wilmington to pick up Vice President-elect Biden & family and continue on to Washington Union Station. This historic occasion will make for some great coffee table inauguration train books filled with full page photos. The designated railway route closely follows that traveled by President-elect Lincoln in 1861! After 50 years of massive and almost total dismemberment of the worlds largest national passenger railway network the new leadership in Washington realizes the value of passenger, freight railroads and railway infrastructure as strategic social, economic and military assets. Compare the use of railway travel on this historic occasion to the ''ROYAL TRAIN'' that Queen Elizabeth Prince Phillip Prince Charles & family use frequently for travel in the UK for family, business and matters of state.
Posted by James Mancuso on 1/7/2009 10:19:54 AM
It's about time we got a president who recognizes the importance of both passenger and freight railroading as a vital part of the nation's infrastructure. I am glad to see that peabrained moron from Texas going. He has left this country more screwed up than when he first found it. Not only that, but here in New York State, we have Mr. Magoo for governor!
Posted by James Swidergal on 1/7/2009 11:05:40 AM
Dear James Mancuso...I'd rather have Mr Magoo then this deadbeat,senate seat selling moron here in Illinois. What's an Illinoisan to do with an ex-governor in the slammer,and the present one on his way,maybe here in Illinois we should make it a pre-requisite that if you want to run for political office here one requires to be a convicted felon at the least...haha!
Posted by Larry Kaufman on 1/8/2009 11:38:11 AM
How about a bit of decorum, eh, guys? The governor of NY has a serious sight problem that makes him legally blind. That doesn't appear to affect either his judgment or his ability to govern. If you are capable of using the Internet and participating in blogs, I would hope you are capable of expressing yourselves without resorting to language that demeans. Mr. Magoo was a cartoon character; I've not seen anyone other than at this blogsite referring to the NY governor as a cartoon character.
