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After starting as a waybill sorter and working his way up to president and chief executive officer of two short lines and one regional, William Drusch has called it a career.

Drusch, 59, retired last month as CEO of the 517-mile Red River Valley & Western Railroad Co. (RRVW), 229-mile Twin Cities & Western Railroad Co. (TC&W) and 94-mile Minnesota Prairie Line Inc. (MPL), and president of TC&W and MPL. His railroad career spanned 38 years.

Drusch’s successors will be multiple hat wearers, as well. Andrew Thompson has assumed Drusch’s post as CEO of the three railroads. Last year, Thompson became RRVW’s president and chief operating officer after Drusch decided to focus on his CEO duties. And TC&W and MPL Executive Vice President and COO Mark Wegner last month was promoted to president of both railroads to succeed Drusch in those capacities.

Since his railroading start at the former Northern Pacific Railway in 1969, Drusch has tried to take on additional responsibilities and face new challenges. He accepted higher-ranking positions at the Northern Pacific and former Burlington Northern Railroad, then became manager of revenue accounting for the Minneapolis, Northfield and Southern Railroad (now part of Canadian Pacific Railway).

In 1980, Drusch joined the Escanaba & Lake Superior Railroad Co. in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula as director of field operations. He became VP of operations in 1990.

Traffic diversion
During his tenure at the Escanaba & Lake Superior, the 347-mile short line’s key iron ore and automotive businesses began to decline along with those industries’ economic fortunes. Drusch helped the road attract pulp and paper traffic to compensate, sometimes taking business away from Class Is.

Learning how to deal with a variety of shippers and compete with Class Is proved valuable. After joining the TC&W — a short line spun off from the former Soo Line Railroad — in 1993 as president and COO, Drusch and his sales team tried to convince grain company officials and elevator managers to move grain on the short line.

“Most of all, it was a matter of personal service and personal interaction,” says Drusch. “We didn’t go in there and sell them, and then just get out of there. We kept up the interaction on a day-to-day basis.”

The personal-touch service helped TC&W increase carloads from 10,000 in 1993 to 22,000 today.

Drusch scored similar successes with grain traffic at RRVW, where he became COO in 2000. He convinced BNSF Railway Co. to move grain in mini-shuttle trains — North Dakota moves BNSF sales executives didn’t think were worthwhile, says Drusch — and the regional now serves five grain elevators that move 14,000 carloads annually.

“In the short-line industry, we need to feel our way into making the Class Is

embrace us,” says Drusch. “We need to give them a reason to do business with us.”

The TC&W had two good reasons of late for CPR to move more traffic with the short line: ethanol and intermodal.

The Class I hadn’t ever moved ethanol, so Drusch and his sales team a few years ago conducted a presentation for CPR officers at the railroad’s Calgary, Alberta, headquarters on ethanol traffic’s advantages and growth opportunities. Now, the Class I and short line serve three ethanol plants on TC&W’s line, with some traffic moving in unit trains to New York and California.

And CPR and TC&W are about to begin moving export containers from the short line’s terminal in Montevideo, Minn., to CPR’s Minneapolis terminal to West Coast ports.

“We expect to move 120 containers a week initially,” says Drusch.

Reaching out
It isn’t common for a short line to start up an intermodal move, he says — or forge a public-private partnership to revive business on a line, for that matter.

In 2001 — the year he became CEO of the three railroads — Drusch helped convince the Minnesota Regional Rail Authority to partner with TC&W to restore a 94-mile line between Norwood and Hanley Falls, Minn.

“We showed them we could move the freight if they invested in upgrading the line,” he says.

TC&W formed MPL as operator and the authority assumed ownership of the line. During the past three years, the authority has spent $8 million to upgrade the line.

“Now, we have an ethanol plant on the line,” says Drusch. “You hear so much today about how railroads should form public-private partnerships, and we did that years ago.”

RRVW managers didn’t hear much about locomotive usage measures until Drusch arrived and emphasized equipment utilization, says Thompson, who’s worked with Drusch the past two years.

“He’s a numbers and results-oriented guy,” says Thompson. “He figured out how we could haul freight with fewer locomotives and less fuel consumption.”

Thompson and Wegner might call on Drusch to solicit his advice on the TC&W’s plan to launch a new railroad in northern Minnesota (a start-up deal Drusch couldn’t talk much about).

But for now, Drusch is content to enjoy retirement in his Eagan, Minn., home and wait for his wife to retire early next year.

“I’ll be playing a lot of golf in the meantime,” he says.