Railroad News

MTA Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) on Monday shared details of its performance improvement plan.

The plan outlines nearly 60 actions the railroad will take to boost service reliability, seasonal preparedness and customer communications.

Amtrak will rename its train station in Rochester, New York, after the late U.S. Rep. Louise Slaughter, the railroad announced yesterday.

The station will be renamed as a dedication to the congresswoman's career in public service and commitment to leading several projects in northern New York, including the station's development, Amtrak officials said in a press release.

Two teams have qualified to bid on a project to design, build, finance, operate and maintain an express rail system between downtown Chicago and O'Hare International Airport.

The two eligible teams are O'Hare Xpress LLC and Elon Musk's infrastructure firm The Boring Co. The O'Hare Xpress team consists of Meridiam, Antarctica Capital LLC, JLC Infrastructure, Mott MacDonald and First Transit.

U.S. railroads managed a busy week of traffic ending March 17, with carloads up 7.5 percent to 263,352 units and intermodal volume up 12.7 percent to 273,986 trailers and containers compared with the same week a year ago.

For the week, U.S. rail traffic grew 10 percent to 537,338 carloads and intermodal units compared with volume in the same week in 2017, according to the Association of American Railroads' (AAR) data.

Metra's board yesterday approved a $29.4 million contract to renovate and expand the mechanical shops that house its rail-car and locomotive rehab programs.

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Rolls-Royce Power Systems and Force Motors have signed an agreement to form a joint venture to be known as Force MTU Power Systems Pvt. Ltd. The joint venture will produce Motor engine and Turbine Union's (MTU) 10- and 12-cylinder Series 1600 units, which are suitable for power generation and rail underfloor applications, Rolls-Royce officials said in a press release. Under the agreement, the joint venture will build a dedicated manufacturing facility in Chakan, India. Besides manufacturing Series 1600 units, the joint venture also will build Series 1600 generator sets for the Indian and global markets. The joint venture will handle sales and service of Series 1600 generator for users in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, while Rolls-Royce Power Systems will handle sales and service elsewhere in the world.

Schneider has completed its conversion to a company-owned and -managed chassis fleet with the purchase of more than 15,000 intermodal container chassis over the past four years. The new equipment is among the investments and improvements the company is deploying to deliver "truck-like service" in the intermodal market, Schneider officials said in a press release. The chassis conversion is expected to drive consistent and cost-efficient shipping, increase availability, decrease downtime and boost safety, they said. Schneider also plans to add intermodal containers to its network, as well as drivers, chassis and tractors to support shippers' needs.

Amtrak exceeded its diesel fuel conservation goal by more than 2.4 gallons and saved about 3 billion kWh of energy by using its latest-generation ACS-64 locomotives in fiscal years 2016 and 2017.

That's according to Amtrak's FY2016-17 sustainability report, which was released on Monday. The report focuses on the railroad's environmental, financial and social sustainability efforts, including modernizing the customer experience, reducing fuel and energy use, and growing revenue through increased ridership. The document reflects Amtrak's performance from Oct. 1, 2015 through Sept. 30, 2017.

G3 Canada Ltd. yesterday announced plans to build two new grain elevators, one in Alberta and the other in Saskatchewan.

The new grain elevators will be served by Canadian Pacific and CN.

GE Transportation has completed the first of 100 locomotive modernizations for Norfolk Southern Railway in 2018 and has received an order to modernize 80 Canadian Pacific locomotives this year, the manufacturer announced yesterday.

President Donald Trump has designated Ann Begeman as chair of the Surface Transportation Board (STB), the White House announced yesterday.

Begeman, a Republican, is serving her second five-year term on the board, following her nomination by President Barack Obama on Dec. 7, 2016, and her unanimous confirmation by the U.S. Senate on Dec. 9, 2016.

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) has released a draft environmental impact report for a project aimed at reducing the time it takes for its Red and Purple line subway trains to turn around at LA Union Station.

The project calls for widening the tunnel entrance to the subway between the Division 20 subway yards and Union Station, along with adding switches, track and other necessary infrastructure.

Positive train control (PTC) systems are operating on about 56 percent of freight railroads' route miles that are required to be governed by PTC systems, up from 45 percent in third-quarter 2017 and 16 percent on Dec. 31, 2016, the Federal Railroad Administration announced yesterday.

Passenger railroads have made less progress, with PTC systems in operation on 24 percent of required route miles as of Q4 2017 — the same as in Q3 2017, FRA officials said in a press release.

Metra next week will launch a $2.95 million project to renovate the LaSalle Street Station concourse in downtown Chicago.

Crews will replace the 20,000-square-foot concourse surface, as well as support pillars.

The Pacific Harbor Line (PHL) this year marks its 20th anniversary.

The Anacostia Rail Holdings-owned short line held a ceremony last month to mark the occasion. The event included a tour of PHL facilities aboard a special train, Anacostia officials said in a press release.

The Canadian government will provide the funding to replace VIA Rail Canada Inc.'s fleet in the Quebec City-Windsor corridor, Canada's Minister of Transport Marc Garneau announced yesterday.

The existing rolling stock in the corridor is reaching the end of its useful life and needs to be replaced to help maintain passenger safety for the next 30 years, Transport Canada officials said in a press release.