Freight railroads work to resolve service problems, delays

By JOSH FUNK, AP Business Writer
Published: April 13, 2022, 7:41am



FILE - A BNSF railroad train hauling carloads of coal from the Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming is seen east of Hardin, Mont., on July 15, 2020. The major freight railroads are hiring aggressively and asking customers to cut the number of carloads they are shipping to reduce congestion along the rail network in response to concerns from agricultural and ethanol groups that prompted regulators to schedule a hearing on the problems. (AP Photo/Matthew Brown, File)

OMAHA, Neb. — Some grain elevators are so full that farmers trying to sell their crops are being turned away. But at the same time, flour and animal-feed mills are halting production because they can’t get the grain they need. ... The issue? The lack of trains to move the grain.

Federal regulators are holding hearings later this month to look into the causes of the dearth of rail capacity, which the railroads largely attribute to factors outside their control, like the broader supply-chain issues and widespread labor shortages. ... But shippers, regulators and rail labor groups say they believe the heart of the problem is that railroads cut too deeply when they eliminated nearly one-third of their workforce in recent years in the name of efficiency.

“The cuts were too severe,” said Max Fisher, chief economist for the National Grain and Feed Association. “Now there’s no buffer capacity to respond to increases in demand or problems in weather or train derailments and things like that. That buffer capacity that used to be in place is no longer there.”

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Union Pacific said it has hired 450 additional workers since January and BNSF says it is on pace to hire 1,000 people this year. Norfolk Southern is offering $5,000 bonuses to new employees as it ramps up its hiring efforts. CSX has also been hiring aggressively. But hiring takes a while to have an effect because of the length of time it takes to train new employees. ... The railroads have also taken hundreds of locomotives out of storage since winter to help them handle additional demand, and BNSF and Union Pacific have also imposed stricter attendance rules to help ensure they have the crews they need to operate those trains.

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