Name: copynpaste
E-mail:
Employed as: Employed in other capacity, for Less than 1 year
Posted: 05 August 2017
Railroad workers at CSX face the dictates of Wall Street
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/08/01/rail-a01.html
CSX railroad workers denounce Wall Street plundering
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/08/01/rail-a01.html
Mr Harrison,
You personally dont know me, and I personally dont know you, but your
comment of personnel "push back" has struck me in the wrong manner.
I, as a dedicated 8 year employee and 4th generation railroader, take
that very personal. I have held many jobs within CSX ranks over the
last 8 years, including Conductor,Swithchman(RCO), Yardmaster, Retarder
Operator, and Locomotive Engineer. I come to work at
night,holidays,weekends,in the snow,ice,thunderstorms,you name it Im
still there. When you 1st became CEO things looked very very promising.
We went to 2 man hump jobs, Engineer Foreman/Brakeman bowl jobs. My
terminal was absolutely moving the freight. My terminal alone was
processing,( thats arriving,inspecting,humping,classifying,and
departing) anywhere from 2000-2200 cars in a 24 hour period. Thats 2nd
to none on your system. We would rival your "premier" hump number
wise on a daily basis. After time though you all fired all our
managers, cut jobs, piled the freight in,( 1000 cars every 8 hours),
and expected us to move it with half the manpower. After it was all
said and done, we were told we were failures and we would be shut off.
The upper management has done this with every hump you have closed thus
far. Its not only unfair, but makes those of us who actually have pride
as railroaders, well lets just say its a ding in the old paint. Also
our new management that most have came from the CN are more like mob
bosses, than leaders. Men are constantly threatened with their jobs on
the line, we are told to switch cars like back in the 50's when
injury/fatality rates were high, and its just a matter of time before
we have a headline injury or fatality. Men are getting cussed up one
side and down the other, and shown no absolute professionalism in the
least little way. Even with that aside, Ill give you and whomever else
that reads this a little insight as to why their are service
disruptions on csx. Ill just go over some speaking points from quotes
you have put out.
“Together, we will implement precision scheduled railroading — a model
proven to improve safety, create better service for customers, produce
a proud and winning culture for employees, and generate exceptional,
lasting value for shareholders,”
This is the farthest from the truth. Your increase in pace, to try to
compensate the flat switching instead of humping, is going to end with
injury and possibly someones life. Its already proven this is not,and
will not work as far customer service. Morale is at an all time low.
Our stock, well, ya know how thats going.
The prevailing view in the rail industry is that more locomotives,
more cars and more crews allow for the movement of more volume.
Precision railroading challenges this view,”
You have stored alot of locomotives. Took away alot of switch engines
as well. Where Im from we are not "flat landers" if you will. If and
when we get to the customer, we now run the risk of not being able to
service them due to not having enough power to do the work at hand.
Also almost every one of your road trains has foreign power on them.
What your making up in storing locomotives, your paying right back out
in horsepower hours to another railroad. Crew availability system wide
is an absolute joke. You have intermodal trains sitting for days at a
time, due to either conjestion, or crew availability. You have cut
extraboards, and regular jobs to below minimum standards. Also you have
cut off the pushers system wide. Im gonna tell ya a little secret you
may or may not know though. One of my former territories has had a
pusher district for over 160 years, its the steepest mainline grade,as
side from saluda, east of the mississippi. You cut the assignments off,
but they are calling extra jobs off of the freight pools,and extraboards
there to push trains, every 12 hours. They are just advertised as extra
turn jobs, and not pushers. Trust me though they are still there. Every
terminal you have piled the freight on, has a back log of traffic
sitting in sidings, waiting to be switched. I have read your book and
alot does make sense but no two things are alike. CP was a majority
bulk hauler from their reports, as we are a major mixed manifest
hauler. We are not a place where blocks of cars can ride a 1000 miles
across the plains before it needs to be classified again. If your a
brain surgeon, and Im a spine surgeon, does that mean we can do open
heart surgery together? Im not undermining your CEO abilities, but from
where I and the rest of your workforce stands, its the upper management
that has this place in the turmoil that its in. I understand you did
not need 12 humps, but your cut and slash of 8 humps, 2 of them I know
being major players, is borderline absurd. The old saying of "
Attitude reflects leadership" comes to mind, and to be blunt your
"pushing the blame" off on your employees, just shows what style of
leader you are. Everyone in my terminal,and for the majority system
wide are doing all they can do,to try to make this happen, but its
going to fail because you are leading us this way. CSX was a very
profitable railroad, and I personally think if you could blend some of
CSX's old methods, with a blend of "Presicion Railroading" we as a
whole would be unstoppable. Either way it makes me no difference . If I
get told by my local "Capo" to go run an engine of the drawbridge
tomorrow while its open, well I will because Im a team player, always
have, and always will.
Sincerly,
Well I best not say.
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