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Has the cost of out of court settlements and damaged/destroyed equipment and freight exceeded the annual savings of laying off however many hundreds or thousands of employees yet? I feel like that would have to happen before management would even take notice.
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May 28, 2015 19:25
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ijustam posted:Did it take a bunch of people dying to convince railroads that a one person crew is a bad idea? http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-27/amtrak-crash-seen-as-quashing-idea-of-one-person-freight-crews You seem surprised. Also, they aren't convinced, they're just aware that people aren't interested in hearing about it till they forget about the dead people. I have to say, the electronic air brake idea does seem good-ish, at least all the cars would brake simultaneously so you wouldn't end up with the crazy slack and mixed freight interactions described in B4Ctom1's post when throwing the emergency brake. Unless I'm missing something, which is entirely possible.
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May 29, 2015 01:12
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1 man crews represent pretty considerable cost savings. Both east coast roads could stand to save in the $300-$400million dollar range at least(assuming 5500 conductors needed to operate LOR trains and $70k avg salary/benfits). A couple of percentage points on the all important operating ratio.
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May 29, 2015 02:09
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Electronic brakes don't save much in terms of derailment prevention. Lots of derailment is attributed to broken axles, broken rail and other factors. Electronic brakes won't really prevent any derailments. But yes, if they can get rid of all people on trains, they would be happy. Its all about the bottom dollar and numbers. How many deaths can we pay out before it gets to costly, etc. Railroads are notoriously ruthless, hence the term "getting railroaded"
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May 29, 2015 07:04
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BrokenKnucklez posted:But yes, if they can get rid of all people on trains, they would be happy. Its all about the bottom dollar and numbers. How many deaths can we pay out before it gets to costly, etc. Railroads are notoriously ruthless, hence the term "getting railroaded" I don't know any the high level finance poo poo that occurs but it seems to me, a lowly terminal manager, to be unwise. There are a lot of potential customers out there, a number that grows year over year, as the shortage of people willing and able to drive trucks fails to keep pace with the amount of loads that need to get trucked. If you build it, and then service it promptly, politely and upon request, they will come. Service, already abysmal, would suffer longterm for the sake of improving a number short term.
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May 29, 2015 21:30
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MassivelyBuckNegro posted:I don't know any the high level finance poo poo that occurs but it seems to me, a lowly terminal manager, to be unwise. There are a lot of potential customers out there, a number that grows year over year, as the shortage of people willing and able to drive trucks fails to keep pace with the amount of loads that need to get trucked. If you build it, and then service it promptly, politely and upon request, they will come. As a poster put it some pages back: "Profitable by accident"
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May 30, 2015 00:35
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MassivelyBuckNegro posted:I don't know any the high level finance poo poo that occurs but it seems to me, a lowly terminal manager, to be unwise. There are a lot of potential customers out there, a number that grows year over year, as the shortage of people willing and able to drive trucks fails to keep pace with the amount of loads that need to get trucked. If you build it, and then service it promptly, politely and upon request, they will come. Hell, if they showed up at a reasonable time they would make more money. But these companies would much rather chase business off than build new infrastructure Edit: I didn't know we had a trucker shortage.
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May 30, 2015 16:39
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BrokenKnucklez posted:Edit: I didn't know we had a trucker shortage. Neither did I, but that would explain amazon willing to foot 95% of the class bill for employees to get a cdl license. I had assumed it was mostly because there is a limit of like $5k/year and since the class is only for a few months, there was the difference. Trucker shortage would be a good reason too though. Edit: oh, and there is no strings attached to them footing it either. They could do that for you, and then they'll even give you a lump sum if you so desire while quitting to help you out. Of course, the lump sum does have the attached string that you can never work at amazon or a subsidiary again. Not even as a temp.
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May 30, 2015 20:45
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BrokenKnucklez posted:Edit: I didn't know we had a trucker shortage. There's always a "trucker shortage" everywhere, with the industry promising higher wages due to increased demand for drivers. It never happens, and there's a shortage because the pay is poo poo so no-one wants to do it.
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May 30, 2015 21:08
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Mooseykins posted:There's always a "trucker shortage" everywhere, with the industry promising higher wages due to increased demand for drivers. It never happens, and there's a shortage because the pay is poo poo so no-one wants to do it. That's the way I see it, the trucker shortage is exactly the same as the pilot shortage...it's not a personnel shortage, it's a pay shortage. There just aren't enough idiots out there willing to work for the money given.
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May 30, 2015 21:14
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Mooseykins posted:There's always a "trucker shortage" everywhere, with the industry promising higher wages due to increased demand for drivers. It never happens, and there's a shortage because the pay is poo poo so no-one wants to do it. This is the propaganda that gets played anywhere. IT/software people run into the same rhetoric as justification for expanding the H1-B program.
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May 30, 2015 21:24
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MrChips posted:That's the way I see it, the trucker shortage is exactly the same as the pilot shortage...it's not a personnel shortage, it's a pay shortage. There just aren't enough idiots out there willing to work for the money given. That's how economics works. The pay isn't worth the lifestyle, risks or personal liability. Its the kind of job first generation immigrants and really poor Americans do(purely anecdotal observation).
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May 31, 2015 02:51
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MassivelyBuckNegro posted:I don't know any the high level finance poo poo that occurs but it seems to me, a lowly terminal manager, to be unwise. There are a lot of potential customers out there, a number that grows year over year, as the shortage of people willing and able to drive trucks fails to keep pace with the amount of loads that need to get trucked. If you build it, and then service it promptly, politely and upon request, they will come. It's very easy to explain, sadly: Say you get hired as a new CEO for one of these companies. You go in, fire a bunch of people, drop maintenance, and a year later you get a massive bonus because income was about the same and expenses lower (and the bonus was based on the profit). Then you stay on until things start catching up, cash out a nice parting payout, and move on.
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May 31, 2015 03:35
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MrChips posted:That's the way I see it, the trucker shortage is exactly the same as the pilot shortage...it's not a personnel shortage, it's a pay shortage. There just aren't enough idiots out there willing to work for the money given. Yeap. There are companies out there right now trying to pay drivers .25 cents a mile. That's less than they paid drivers back in the '80s. I read somewhere that in the UK, they are now begging Pollacks to come work for them in the UK. MassivelyBuckNegro posted:That's how economics works. The pay isn't worth the lifestyle, risks or personal liability. Its the kind of job first generation immigrants and really poor Americans do(purely anecdotal observation). IE Port work. Not many people want to deal with Union slowdowns and loving idiots climbing over your rig and driving in LA or Oakland for the money.
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May 31, 2015 04:46
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InterceptorV8 posted:There are companies out there right now trying to pay drivers .25 cents a mile. That's less than they paid drivers back in the '80s. I read somewhere that in the UK, they are now begging Pollacks to come work for them in the UK. Actually they now want the Romanians and Bulgarians. The Poles have been in the EU long enough and have a much-improved economy that they don't want to work for the poo poo money. But for the EU-noobs like Romanians and Bulgarians it's still better money than they'd make back home. Some recruitment companies are offering cash incentives if you can recruit your foreign mates to come here and drive a truck. Class 2 (rigid/straight trucks) wages top out about 32k for most jobs, and that's multi-drop tail lift distribution or something. Don't know what flatbed/crane hire drivers make, or what Class 1 (artics/semis) are on. If you're single and have been doing it 10 years you could probably do Euro Class 1 and if you're lucky you might see 45k. Our cost of living is much higher too, so the money is never great really.
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May 31, 2015 13:35
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I love the thought of people with dubious driving ed barreling next to the unprotected bike lane. They drive 7% of kilometers but are responsible for a third of cyclist fatalities. In the UK foreign drivers also kept killing people on the highway cause they couldn't/wouldn't check the right side blind spot.
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May 31, 2015 15:50
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well the UK wants to leave the EU anyway, so maybethen they'll have to start hiring locals and paying more (who am I kidding?)
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May 31, 2015 17:52
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evil_bunnY posted:In the UK foreign drivers also kept killing people on the highway cause they couldn't/wouldn't check the right side blind spot. It's extremely unhelpful that the lorries they drive tend to be LHD. Having only driven in the UK for a total of 3 weeks on 2 separate vacations, I still had several exciting encounters with eastern European trucks , enough to make me quite nervous. The combination of driving on the other side of the road and not being oriented to the center line makes a lethal brew.
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Jun 1, 2015 02:57
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I saw a story pop up on my feed about some locals who have found some of the track from the original Ghan route (The (Af)Ghan is Australias interior north-south railway) and the story had this image of one of the original locomotives crossing some floodwaters in the outback http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-06-01/old-ghan-rail-line-find-excites-ghost-town-volunteers/6512548 c1870's 
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Jun 1, 2015 14:04
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drunkill posted:I saw a story pop up on my feed about some locals who have found some of the track from the original Ghan route (The (Af)Ghan is Australias interior north-south railway) and the story had this image of one of the original locomotives crossing some floodwaters in the outback Australia special: a locomotive with a crocodile catcher on the front.
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Jun 1, 2015 15:15
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Jun 1, 2015 17:50
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Oh crap, that looks like a brake failure on the truck 
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Jun 1, 2015 18:55
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Holy poo poo. I hope the trucker had time to bail.
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Jun 1, 2015 19:01
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Terrible Robot posted:Holy poo poo. I hope the trucker had time to bail. Apparently the driver was killed.
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Jun 1, 2015 19:12
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meltie posted:Oh crap, that looks like a brake failure on the truck Icy road?
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Jun 1, 2015 19:14
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InterceptorV8 posted:Icy road? Oh yeah, that's pretty obvious. Ouch
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Jun 1, 2015 19:19
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Mooseykins posted:Apparently the driver was killed. Where was it?
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Jun 1, 2015 19:24
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CharlesM posted:Where was it? Kazakhstan e: RT.com article on it
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Jun 1, 2015 20:21
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Wow that was a pretty close thing, the driver must've gotten out alri- 
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Jun 2, 2015 07:20
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why is the sign in english
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Jun 3, 2015 02:36
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Stop signs are commonly but not universally in English.  Same deal in Finland.
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Jun 3, 2015 09:38
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yeah idk why it's in English but it's correct. I'd have expected it to be bilingual like the danger sign http://www.adcidl.com/pdf/Kazakhstan-Road-Traffic-Signs.pdf e: history 
Rude Dude With Tude fucked around with this message at 10:34 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 3, 2015 10:14
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"STOP" is in english because that's what the Vienna Convention on Road Signs mandates* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vienna_Convention_on_Road_Signs_and_Signals Well, it mandates 'stop' must be written on the sign in english or a national language, but most countries interpret it wrongly as "STOP" must literally be on the sign. SybilVimes fucked around with this message at 10:55 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 3, 2015 10:53
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So the people in charge of writing clear, unambiguous signs wrote a regulation (about making clear, unambiguous signs) that was so ambiguous and unclear that other experts in charge of writing safety-critical instructions mis-read them and made signs that were less clear than they otherwise might have been. I learned something about humanity today.
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Jun 4, 2015 22:30
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Ron Swanson mourns: http://www.wthr.com/story/29254390/70000-pounds-of-bacon-spill-in-illinois-amtrak-crash
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Jun 6, 2015 15:23
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Holy poo poo the US, what is with all the rail crashes? Is it just because PROFIT is king on American railways and everything else, including safety, comes second? All these crashes remind me of the late 90's/early 00's in Britain where Railtracks raging incompetence caused horrific crashes to be in vogue. Is the government looking to step in and sort this poo poo out like the UK government did, or is it not even on the radar?
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Jun 9, 2015 15:40
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I assume the "Safety first, until it affects production" motto holds true worldwide.
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Jun 9, 2015 15:52
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Klaus Kinski posted:I assume the "Safety first, until it affects production" motto holds true worldwide. Sure, which is why you need rules and regulators with enough bite to make it cheaper to do things properly. (And optionally a state owned track owner/maintainer without a profit motive, but down that path D&D lies).
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Jun 9, 2015 16:55
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MikeCrotch posted:Holy poo poo the US, what is with all the rail crashes? Is it just because PROFIT is king on American railways and everything else, including safety, comes second? All these crashes remind me of the late 90's/early 00's in Britain where Railtracks raging incompetence caused horrific crashes to be in vogue. Is the government looking to step in and sort this poo poo out like the UK government did, or is it not even on the radar? Yes, profit over safety most definitely caused that Amtrak train to hit the truck that stopped on the crossing instead of hopping over it like trains in Europe do.
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Jun 9, 2015 17:14
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Erwin posted:Yes, profit over safety most definitely caused that Amtrak train to hit the truck that stopped on the crossing instead of hopping over it like trains in Europe do. I'm pretty sure British Rail would have tried to build a truck-hoppin' train if they thought they could have gotten away with it.
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Jun 9, 2015 17:28
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