TOPEKA, Kan. — Union Pacific next month will begin a pilot program in Nebraska that will compare how quickly conductors and truck-based railroaders can respond to problems that trains encounter en route.
The railroad disclosed the first of its kind Class I railroad test program Monday during a public hearing on the Kansas Department of Transportation’s proposed two-person crew rule.
UP in December announced its intent to launch a four-phase pilot program to test the concept of an “expediter” position, but that was scuttled in January when SMART-TD, the union that represents conductors, refused to participate.
Now the union is on board under a new crew consist agreement. The deal creates the expanded utility position — a scheduled, $50-per-hour job — and protects the conductor position through the start of the next round of national contract negotiations that begin in 2025.
“On May 31, General Committee 953, part of SMART-TD, ratified a crew consist agreement that gives Union Pacific the ability to establish a ground-based enhanced utility position,” railroad spokeswoman Robynn Tysver says. “This position works on a fixed schedule and is dispatched in a truck to respond to planned and unplanned events along the mainline. The idea is to learn how this role can support train movement. While these operations are ongoing, two people will remain in the cab.”
Ultimately UP wants to redeploy conductors to ground-based positions in territory that’s protected by positive train control, but that would hinge on reaching additional agreements with labor unions.
In a December public hearing on the Federal Railroad Administration’s proposed two-person crew rule, UP officials said that ground-based expediters would be able to more safely and more efficiently play the role conductors do today from the locomotive cab. PTC has significantly reduced the conductor’s tasks out on the main line, they say, and an expediter would be better able to handle troubleshooting and fixing mechanical problems en route.
The first test phase will begin in August on the South Morrill Subdivision, UP’s coal-hauling route across western Nebraska that is paralleled by a state highway. The double-track line carries an average of 26 trains per day, according to recent regulatory filings regarding the railroad’s Powder River Basin coal volume.
The second phase will begin in September on UP’s single-track Greeley Subdivision, which links Denver and Speer Junction, Wyo. The line handles locals, unit trains, and intermodal trains, some of which have work events en route.
UP did not say whether two additional pilot program phases that were originally contemplated in more complex territory — between Pocatello, Idaho, and Portland, Ore., and on the Herington and Topeka subdivisions in Kansas — ultimately will be part of this round of tests.
Jason Pinder, UP’s general director of network development, told Kansas transportation officials that the railroad believes truck-based workers will be able to respond more quickly than conductors in two-thirds of instances, which will help improve customer service, reduce the time grade crossings are blocked by a train with mechanical problems, and help keep employees safe.
The expediter will cover trains operating over a set territory. UP will test how large the territory should be and how the railroad can respond to unforeseen events like the expediter’s truck breaking down.
“We know that we’re going to need to learn as we go,” Pinder says.
UP opposes the Kansas two-person crew rule, Pinder says, because it lacks a safety justification, would be preempted by federal regulation, would impede technological innovation, and hurt railroads’ ability to compete with trucks.
A two-person crew rule also would eliminate the ability of the railroad and unions to negotiate contracts that would create scheduled positions like expediters, Pinder says. The scheduled expediter job can improve the quality of life compared to unscheduled conductor jobs that require railroaders to be away from home.
Representatives of BNSF Railway, short line holding companies Genesee & Wyoming and Watco, and the American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association told Kansas transportation officials that they opposed the proposed rule.
Union officials backed the Kansas proposal, which mirrors many state efforts to set crew size through regulation or new laws.
“We are huge proponents of the public safety regulation that KDOT is proposing,” Ty Dragoo, the Kansas State Legislative Director for SMART-TD, said at the hearing.
Conductors play an important safety role by providing an extra set of eyes and ears for the engineer and are first responders when a train is involved in a grade-crossing accident or derailment, union officials said.
Some of the Class I railroads say the locomotive-based conductor position should no longer be required in territory protected by PTC, the system that is designed to prevent collisions and overspeed accidents.
Like UP, BNSF is seeking to redeploy conductors. “We are still negotiating potential pilot programs that would test the feasibility of a ground-based conductor position,” BNSF spokesman Zak Andersen says.
Norfolk Southern and SMART-TD announced in March that they were ending negotiations over the redeployment of conductors to ground-based positions and are instead in talks about other ways to improve railroaders’ quality of life.
CSX Transportation and Canadian Pacific Kansas City officials have said that they currently have no interest in ground-based conductors. Canadian National has declined to comment on the issue.
I have no issue with a pilot program. I have huge issues with less than two people in the cab. The same morons that want one man crews are the ones that want 2-3 mile trains, trains that would take half an hour to reach from the front to the end in case of problems. There are many areas in the West that are difficult of access.
It would be possible to have one person crews in Japan, because the Japanese keep their track and equipment to a high standard. It is impossible in the US because the standard is just to get by, just good enough so it doesn’t break down on my division and what happens on the next one is not my problem.
There’s a mining company in Australia that runs crewless trains, because there’s nothing but desert, it works for them, despite what these CEO’s here in the US want, there won’t be any crewless trains running here.
The guy representing up got promoted for painting clearance marks on the rail so his testimony is suspect
Bye Bye conductors – Hello one man crew. Next move to eliminate engineer. Tech experts can program all train info, tonnage, weight, length and program the route with slow orders, crossings, etc and let the train go. Forward facing cameras are all ready in locomotives.
Someone in the Harriman can just watch every so often to see how train is doing. Sensors on engines will be used to detect collisions with kill switches.
Not in use in class ones but has been used in other areas. Like the old phrase coming to a theater near you soon.
I somewhat agree but with how they maintain the locomotives these super sweet systems you talk about will work 12% of the time but they will hire 2000 more managers to every 1conductor/engineer they cut so they can have a meeting on how to make it work
RRs invested as much as $10,000,000,000 in mandated implementation of PTC. Not all of that can be recovered by price increases. The logical argument of eliminating road Conductors in PTC territory is inescapable. It will happen.
Force reduction will occur through attrition, as has occurred in train crew size reduction from 5 to 2.
No railroad has yet to say exactly how PTC has reduced the conductors tasks.
“On May 31, General Committee 953, part of SMART-TD, ratified a crew consist agreement that gives Union Pacific the ability to establish a ground-based enhanced utility position,”
Who is this guy working for? Certainly not the membership. Year after year overpaid union hacks undermine their membership.
Back in the 80s, the general chairman of my union was convicted on embezzlement and racketeering charges and sentenced to federal prison. The money was gambled away in Atlantic city. Railroad executives testified at his sentencing for leniency. Obviously the company loved him! Members not so much; rank and file members had no votes in selecting leadership.
The test will be highly subjective and there will be plenty of overlap so as to make it look reasonable or feasible…… didn’t the up just sign a crew consist agreement with the conductors a month ago? As far as this railroaders concerned at this point in my career they can have it, buy me out and I’ll be done with this fools paradise they call class one railroading———- or corporate America in general.
You watch, during the test period there will be plenty of utility men per mile assigned but if the program is ever implemented you can bet there won’t be half as many assigned and the districts will be huge. They can always slant the test period.
You hit the nail on the head.
I guess the next move will see the engineer operating the train from a truck or car using a smart phone like the way model railroaders are using this technology to run their model trains. Maybe AI {artifical intelligence} wil be the next operator of trains. This is just the start of something that will gain traction and soon be out of control. Mankind and the human race will go the way of the dinosaurs and other living beings if we keep this up . AI will soon be designing and programing AI and computer software. Conductors, eventually engineers and any other railroad workers and personel will go the way of stagecoach drivers, barge men drivers and any other operators and workers in transportation. Too bad we can’t replace the CEOs and executives as well as the Wall Street wizards who are trying to invent new ways to do away with human minds and bodies and all in the name of serving the mighty dollar and profits
Joseph C. Markfelder
What….. The….. Fu-
Elephant’s nose in the tent.