Harrison’s view on yards is different than how CSX has historically viewed its terminals, Frank Lonegro, the railroad’s chief financial officer, said at a transportation conference on Thursday.
“We have been a hump yard-centric eastern railroad,” Lonegro says. “His point is, ‘Why?’”
Classifying merchandise traffic multiple times en route only adds cost and transit time, Lonegro says.
“The big thing he is doing is eliminating infrastructure that we thought was historically required to move that traffic,” Lonegro says.
CSX has converted four other hump yards — Toledo, Ohio; Louisville, Ky.; Hamlet, N.C.; and Atlanta — to flat-switching facilities. As part of the conversions, train plans have been modified so that traffic bypasses the yards, with the exception of cars destined for those locations.
The remaining seven hump yards are under “heavy evaluation” Lonegro says. More hump yards will be converted to flat switching this quarter, Lonegro says, and CSX ultimately will be left with just three or so hump yards.
When converting a hump yard, CSX flat switches using the yard’s receiving and departure tracks. The classification bowl then stands empty. Eventually CSX will redeploy track and switches from the classification bowls, Lonegro says.
On Thursday, Lonegro said that CSX had idled the humps at four yards. Cumberland was not included in that tally due to the timing of the transition, CSX spokesman Rob Doolittle says.
The remaining active hump yards on CSX are at Waycross, Ga.; Birmingham, Ala.; Nashville, Tenn.; Cincinnati; Avon, Ind.; Willard, Ohio; and Selkirk, N.Y.
Hump yards date to an era when a much higher percentage of traffic moved in merchandise service than it does today, Harrison said last month on CSX’s first-quarter earnings call.
Not all of the railroad’s humps are needed today, Harrison says, and some of them are so old that CSX can’t get retarder replacement parts.
“They’re simply not made anymore,” he says.
Michael Welborn locals CAN be based out of anywhere. Where in the article did you get that isn’t happening? Locals are staying just the same.
The sad part of this story is that it took EHH to come in and make these changes. Real CEOs could have had this done without the threats of a full-management takeover.
The tragedy is not is closing some hump yards. Curtailing local assignments will lead to traffic loss as customers opt to truck their business or, if they can, offer it to NS. It’s easy to close several yards when you lose as much carload traffic as CP did.
They just let the engineers and conductors know they’re shutting down Selkirk hump this week. Looks like I got out just in time.
Just curious…why can’t locals be based out of flat switched yards just as easily as out of hump yards? The hump portion didn’t really have much to do with the local traffic…as local freight would have been classified inner network from the origin.
So if Hunter is shown the door, Is CSX going to put all these Hump Yards back into service?All Hunter is doing is wrecking one good Railroad! STOCK HOLDERS VOTE NO! If this guy isn’t removed from the CSX I will never model another CSX Loco or Car, I’m just waiting for JUNE! The Railroad that’s going place’s happens to be Yellow and Gray! Just look at the money they are putting back in there system.
So apparently now the only place we can see a CSX Hump yard would be on a simulator. There goes my trip to Cumberland this summer. Thanks CSX for ruining a perfectly good photography trip.
What?! It was still working when I passed through Cumberland on Sunday evening! Good luck with that one.
(Why did I not take a photo of the hump? Because why would they close that hump. Also it is hard to get a view of it other than standing on a roadway)
Also of note: LOTS of locomotives parked around and behind the loco shop.
This happens to be one of the FEW things that I agree on that CSZ is doing, they don’t need that many hump yards anymore, one per region is quite sufficient, even if you were to quadruple your merchandise traffic in 2 years, that is what block swapping is for.
Sounds to me like I better plan a trip to Radnor SOON.
Looks like after all is said and done. Queensgate, Selkirk, and Waycross might possibly be the only hump yards left untouched.
Sammy — there is a whole lot of great stuff to see and photograph around Cumberland, so don’t cancel your plans!! The hump was always hard to get a clean look at without trespassing. There’s the Locomotive Shop, the grades on Sand Patch and the West End, the bridges and tunnels of the Magnolia Cutoff, plus WMSR at Helmstetters Curve, and the C&O Canal. And now you can even get a view of lots of parked CSX locomotives, to boot!
Cumberland is a fine town to visit and the area’s mountain scenery is fabulous. I always make it a stop on my trips back to Pittsburgh and often try to spend a couple of fall days there. (End of unpaid endorsement)