Okay, so 52 in eight hours is a low number. How many cars, on average, will you switch in an eight hour period? Is the number of cars switched used to measure productivity? Is there a standard? Thanks.
No standards that I know of,or should I say that I care to know of, standards are for the bean counters and planners to deal with. the number of cars "handled" is one measure of productivity,dwell time is another. doing a little math, 52 cars @ 50' in length = 2600 ft of train length. Not a lot of train! My concern was to keep the cars on the rails, handle them so that neither the car nor its contents were damaged, assemble trains on tracks that the yardmaster wants them and in the order that (s)he wants them and to do that without injuring or killing anyone. CT
150-200 cars per shift would probably be a good average for a flat yard, 300-400 per shift for a hump yard.
Interesting responses here. Yes, railroads are by far the most hostile environments I've ever encountered. How many other industries have JOB INSURANCE?!!! The average retirement check drawn is 1 before death. 10 years of it and frankly, I am sick of it. I've even sold all of my model railroad collection that I have been acquiring since the age of 4. I'm seriously considering going back to being an airline pilot. I'll have to take a pay cut but it will be well worth it.
I was with a "legacy" airline for just over 25 years. They went bankrupt. I am collecting my pension from that employment. It is small but fortunately I haven't lost anything due to the bankruptcy. Most of my pension was in an annuity. I sold the stock I owned in that carrier long before they went belly-up. Many of my former colleagues weren't able to do that and they lost EVERYTHING!!!!! I have talked about railroads and their adversarial management style,but let me tell you...airlines are hands-down worse employers! I would NEVER work for another airline! NEVER! let me repeat... N E V E R ! ! ! I was in public contact for most of my airline career and had even made it into lower tier management before I parted company with them. Give me a railroad any day,any time,anywhere! I made more money, had better insurance benefits, better supervision(railroad managers,for the most part,are capable of performing the duties of those they manage-airline managers are not[save for some flight crew managers])I felt more productive and it was the easiest work I've ever done! I actually improved my family's standard of living due to my railroad employment. Stick with the CSX Steve! As we used to say..."Illegitimus non Carborundum"(Don't let the b******s wear you down). If anything, the airline industry will be getting worse! CT
Having worked both sides of the line as well, I agree that Railroading, while having problems, is much preferable to airlines. I worked on the ramp for 5 years and in that time, I saw more "Us vs. Them" from most of the passenger airlines (sans a couple - Southwest and Allegiant stick out as the two I always noticed) than I've heard about since I started railroading 5 years ago. I talk to a lot of the "old heads" on both sides as well, and they all agree that in the airlines, management has gotten worse, and in the railroads it's either maintained the status quo or gotten a little better. Yeah, there's labor issues (like this one, where again, I think we're jumping on the FRA's back for a non-issue since they're just saying they won't prohibit it, not that they won't restrict it), but at least you don't have the number of Union "Yes Men" in railroading that you do in the airlines. You want to see wasted money - go watch an airline staffed by "Yes Men" who do anything and everything to ensure their company fails all in the name of "protecting" their jobs. Air Wisconsin almost failed because of it, United suffered because of it, and I can think of 2 or 3 regionals that have failed because their "Yes Men" on the ground decided that they weren't going to do anything due to perceived (not always actual) "hostility" between them and management.
