Coal Trains Are A Thing Of The Past – Wrong!

"Railroads move more coal than any other commodity. In 2002, coal shipments account for 21 percent of total freight revenue and 44 percent of total freight tonnage transported by Class I railroads. Over time, higher capacity rail cars and more powerful locomotives have increased railroads' coal-carrying efficiency. In 2002, the average coal car carried 111 tons, up 10 percent from the 101 tons in 1993 and approximately double the capacity of coal cars in the 1930s.So-called "unit" trains of 50 or more carloads account for about 85% of railroad coal shipments. Generally, a unit train carries coal from a loading facility straight through to a customer without interruption. Unit trains often operate on a pre-determined schedule, use dedicated equipment, generally follow direct shipping routes, are highly productive, and have lower transportation costs per unit of coal shipped than non-unit train shipments.Coal is by far the most important single commodity carried by rail. Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Union Pacific, CSX, and Norfolk Southern are the top four railroads measured by tons of coal originated. In 2002, coal accounted for 52.7% of all tonnage originated for BNSF, 45.9 percent for NS, 41.5 percent for CSX and 44.2 percent for UP.Coal is also an important commodity for many regional and short line railroads. In 2000, coal was one of the top three commodities for 58 of the 563 non-Class I railroads."Source: http://www.careenergy.com/technology/transportation.aspThought you Activity builders might find this interesting. I know I don't include very many coal trains when doing AI's.Bob Edwards

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RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, ashiva1313, Jun-22-04, 09:46 PM, (1) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, yardlimit, Jun-23-04, 07:41 AM, (2) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, oakpalms, Jun-23-04, 09:58 AM, (3) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, yardlimit, Jun-25-04, 10:05 AM, (4) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, kevarc, Jun-25-04, 10:50 AM, (5) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, westerngy, Jun-25-04, 06:55 PM, (6) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, kevarc, Jun-25-04, 11:25 PM, (7) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, oakpalms, Jun-26-04, 11:47 AM, (8) RE: COAL TRAINS ARE A THING OF THE PAST--WRONG!!, oakpalms, Jun-28-04, 02:40 PM, (9)

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am near Springfield MO.. and we get a LOT of Coal trains here..
seen one once, 9 engines in front, and 5 in back, heading toward Memphis..
in my town they closed the main line west and rerouted the trains through here instead, and for 3 weeks, 3-4 engines in front and 136 empties in back was the norm.

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Cant imagine who would make an assertion like that. We've got coal fired power plants up here from Sherburn county to Stillwater that would go off-line rather quickly without coal trains.

Yardlimit

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Yes, Yardlimit, I hear you, but did you know that over 50% of BNSF tonnage is coal? I don't see that coming through on the activities we download. One would think about the only thing running is pigs and wellcars with a few mixed trains and tankers thrown in. I know I have not been putting in 50% coal train traffic in my activities.Bob

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Good point. I think I got some work to do on my current activity
developement.

Yardlimit

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It depends on the route that you are doing activities for.MP & White fish- maybe one or two a day
TP2 and Cajon - very few, maybe 2 or three a week for export, though with the demand for coking coal in the far east rising, that could change.
Sandpatch - not as many as you think - some export moves and powerplant moves, but a majority of the coal goes west.
Bluefield - This has the most of any route out there -probably 75% of the trains are coal.
Rollins pass - about 6 per day
M&M - Not real sure, but from what I could find, maybe 6 per week
The forthcoming Mountain Sub - about 4 a day
Forthcoming Orin line - 50 or more a day
Forthcoming Cascade line - None that I can tell from my sources.
Ditto for the Surfline
Raton & Glorieta - AS of this time none. There used to be 1 or 2 a week for export and other move east from the York mine. But due to problems at the mine, it has been shut down for a couple of years
Kevin Arceneaux
DEFAULT IS FOR DUMMIES
Cry havoc and Let slip the dogs of war.
It's fun being CRAZY!!!!!
Lone Wolf Activities Forum and Activity Packs are on www.3DTrains.com

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Kevin a question to you.You mention the MOuntain Sub for whic line is it CPRail..if so then there are about 12 loaded a day and equal amount returning empty.Just Rollin Down The Tracks

Dale

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Actually the Mountain sub is CSX between Grafton and Cumberland.Kevin Arceneaux
DEFAULT IS FOR DUMMIES
Cry havoc and Let slip the dogs of war.
It's fun being CRAZY!!!!!
Lone Wolf Activities Forum and Activity Packs are on www.3DTrains.com

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Kevin,Check out the pdf file at http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/ipp/ipp_sum.htmlIt has a listing of over 3000 power plants in the United States as of 2000. Now I know that includes Alaska and Hawaii, and a couple of wind generators, and about a 100 nuclear sites. But, what are most of these power plants burning? I would bet it is coal, and I would bet it is delivered by train in 98% of the cases. My family lives along the old PRR from Vincennes to Indianapols. There is still a train almost every day that takes coal to two power plants from the SW Indiana coal fields. Now if we take and reduce the total power plants down to 2000, and let us say they get a train load of coal every other day--that is about a 1000 loads of coal each day. Let's reduce that to 500 each day that would come out to about 10 loads per each state which some states might not require that often. It still says that there are a lot of coal trains somewhere going to US power plants.I realize that the big coal haulers: CSX and Norfolk Southern are taking huge amounts to the east coast terminals (Norfolk and Baltimore) for overseas shipments. But, some of that coal ends up going to all these power plants. For example, Muleshoe, Texas gets a train load everyday. Where is it shipped from--I think it comes out of Wyoming now, but I am certain it was once shipped from the mine on the Glorieta route. The BNSF now reports 52% of its tonnage is coal--where is it going? Who is feeding all those hungry power plants In California? Hoover Dam can only supply so much of the power--not all of it. Yes, I know there are nuclear plants scattered here and there, but there are a lot of coal burning plants. Locate a coal burning plant and I will bet you will find a train load every other day to feed it. That means feeder routes would have more than that per day.You may be correct, but the statistics seems to say something seems out of place.Bob

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After checking out more details on power plants--there are not all that many coal burning plants! Most are gas/oil powered. There are two coal burning plants in south central California and a few more in the southeast area.However, I did find some info on a steel mill that would be served by the Cajon Pass route that is located in Fontana, CA. For those who have the route, that track passes through the BNSF A yard and goes under the Palmdale cutoff track on the UP/SP tracks. It is the major steel mill in the western US and is still going very strong after taking over from the defunct Kaiser Steel Mill. It is called the California Steel Industries.That means some activities with gondolas filled with rolled steel, and coal trains to and from Fontana.Bob

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