Defiance M&W area to get help

[cmgnnut]

Help is coming for the M&W to rebuild the tracks near Campbell Soup area

[Y@]

Uh...a little more info would be pretty sweet. This doesn't really say much.

[midland sub]

The ORDC granted the M&W another $227,000 to rebuild the tracks between MP 38 and 39. According to the ORDC report the M&W suffers 16% of their derailments between those mileposts. Heavier relay rail and new ties are going are going to be installed. The best of the lifted rail is supposed to be saved for a project for a new spur to Campbells for a possible transload spot for inbound coal loads- 500 per year. The funniest thing in the report was that the M&W spends on average $7300 or so per mile on track work per year. From some of the pics you guys share it looks more like $7300 total for the entire line excluding derailment clean up costs.....

[AARR]

The ORDC granted the M&W another $227,000 to rebuild the tracks between MP 38 and 39. According to the ORDC report the M&W suffers 16% of their derailments between those mileposts. Heavier relay rail and new ties are going are going to be installed. The best of the lifted rail is supposed to be saved for a project for a new spur to Campbells for a possible transload spot for inbound coal loads- 500 per year. The funniest thing in the report was that the M&W spends on average $7300 or so per mile on track work per year. From some of the pics you guys share it looks more like $7300 total for the entire line excluding derailment clean up costs.....

Does anyone know the reasons GTW gave up on Campbell's as a customer when the abandoned their Napoleon branch?

And midland sub, I agree with your assessment of capital spending on MAW. There's no-way they're spending $7,300 per mile...I'd love to see the evidence of that.

[MSchwiebert]

Looks like it's another case of "everything old is new again" as during the DT&I days coal was one of the key inbound products for the Napoleon branch. I'll have to dig through my switchlists but if they use coal at the same rate that they did back in the mid 1970's (they may have newer more efficient boilers now) that could be a nice chunk of business for the Maumee & Western (as well as CSX to deliver the coal to Defiance for interchange).
Based on the info I have - look for it to be in the area of 3 to 5 cars a day (counts were higher in the '70's but 50 and 70 ton hoppers were used most often then too).

If this comes to pass it'll also be interesting to see where the Maumee & Western puts the transload facility. The remnants of the ramp that the DT&I had for trans-loading coal for the long gone Napoleon municipal power plant is still there, but it would require that some track be re-installed (about 800-1000 feet) and the crossing of a street. My guess is that they'd put something in out in the industrial park as that would have the added benefit of keeping the trucks out of town too.

As to why the Grand Trunk lost the business, I don't have anything in writing but there's a couple of "answers" that I've heard over the years.

1. the Grand Trunk did not give the level of service that the DT&I did. Keep in mind that the DT&I viewed Campbell's as a key customer (in fact it was the DT&I that got Campbell's to locate there), while the Grand Trunk did not (there's stories that the damage claims went way up after the Trunk took over - and that they were much more difficult to deal with in settling those claims than the DT&I ever was).

2. During the DT&I days, there was a good balance between "loads in" (coal, tinplate for the cans, raw materials for the soup & pasta made at the plant) and "loads out" (finished soup, juice & other tomato related products, scrap from the can making operation etc.). With the conversion of the boilers to gas, the coal went away and changing logistics in the grocery industry (how many grocery warehouses can or would take a carload of soup these days?) caused much of the car loads to vanish.

3. Issues with the car fleet. The primary home road car used was the DT&I 40' insulated box (19300 series) those were taken out of service (40 year AAR rule) at about the time the Trunk walked away from the business. The newer DT&I cars were all leased - and their leases were not renewed. My guess is that someone "ran the numbers" and couldn't justify the replacement of cars for this service based on what the return on that investment would have been - In the Grand Trunk's defense they weren't making a whole lot of money in the 1980's either and certainly had to invest what they did have in the areas that made the most sense.

4. The condition of the line between Malinta and Napoleon while not bad was starting to slip a bit. The Maumee River Bridge always was restricted to 4 motor power - but in reality if that had become a major issue, the Trunk could have relocated the engine facility to south of the Campbell's plant or at Malinta. There were a few small timber trestles between Malinta & Campbells but nothing major. There was really no reason for them to be north of the river once the portion from Napoleon to Wauseon was abandoned.

In any event, it'll be interesting to see if this comes to pass.

5.

[sd70accsxt700]

They start running 5 cars a day of loaded coal (10 every trip as they only go every other day) there will be daily derailments.

[Y@]

They start running 5 cars a day of loaded coal (10 every trip as they only go every other day) there will be daily derailments.

Daily derailments is already common practice.

[MSchwiebert]

http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/govt ... 5-2010.pdf

For details (look at page 40 and up). Interesting in that the MAW "system map" shows a transfer track in the northwest quadrant at Liberty Center - which has never been built. Also interesting in that the MAW has a good "track record" in paying back the previous loans - I had thought that they had had a few issues with that in the past.

They also mention that if they convince Campbell's to use coal again it would be 500 carloads a year.

[berkmeister]

On the question of why the GTW gave up the Malinta-Napoleon branch; a guy who was a former member and President of the Elkhart Model Railroad Club and i did a lot of railfanning in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio. He's from the Cleveland, Ohio area and seemed very knowlegable about railroad operations in his home state. When we were railfanning western Ohio in the area of Malinta in the late 90's, he told me GTW gave up on the Napoleon branch because Campbell Soup Co. made a corporate-wide decision to quit using rail service at all their nationwide plants in favor of giving all their business to trucking. I never investigated this claim myself, so i couldn't confirm his statement. berkmeister

[AARR]

IIRC GTW maintained a transload at Malinta for Campbell. I think they delivered carrots, tomato paste, etc. I believe it's the same commodities that MAW delivers to the warehouse in Napoleon.

[midland sub]

I asked a retired DT&I-GTW employee from my neck of the woods if he knew anything about the Napoleon branch. He started out in Jackson on a track gang and was forced north to Flat Rock in the b&b dept before retiring in the late '80s. His thoughts on the loss of the Campbell's traffic came down to 2 things: GTW hitting Campbell's with a new rate to justify operations (car fleet, track work and profit) and Campbell's corp decision to switch to trucking. There were issues with the car fleet ( I remember seeing quite a few of the 40 ft cars stored in WCH before heading to scrap) and track work that needed to be done (small trestles and such). Don't forget that GTW wasn't shy about running six axle power south of Springfield on the DT&I to Jackson.

He contradicts the general feeling that GTW gave up on the DT&I online traffic. He remembers quite a few customer spurs were worked on by track crews and an uptick in traffic due to the hard work of the sales dept. A good example was the effort GTW put into growing the traffic south of Springfield at the N&W (NS) interchange at Waverly and CSX at Greggs. He thinks it was around late 1985 or early 1986 when the GTW finally gave up growing traffic on the DT&I south of Toledo.

[MSchwiebert]

I did a quick check using Google Earth and did notice that Paris TX (the other big facility behind Napoleon) does still have rail access, and from the photo it looks like they get inbound paste via rail. Maxton NC also has rail access and did have some cars visible, while Sacramento CA had rail access - but no cars. Granted, that is pretty unscientific but it's a start. For what it's worth, Napoleon also gets tomato paste via the MAW - it's staged at one of the cold storage places across the river.
I can understand why the outbound business went away, in addition to the decline in service in the post DT&I era, the buying patterns of the major food distributors changed too. Instead of shipping an insulated boxcar of soup to their warehouse for picking and separating as the orders came in - why not have a truckload that could be shipped direct to a larger store or "bundled" so it could ship direct to multiple stores? Gets inventory off the books, reduces the need for order fufillment (and people to do so) etc.

[chapmaja]

I have a couple comments.

First, the additional traffic for the M&W would be good for the railroad, if the railroad would be able to support it.

Second, in regards to the GT ownership of the DT&I. GTW was an odd railroad back in the 1980's. They were nothing more than a bridge railroad back then between the CN (who owned them) and the railroads in Chicago and Detroit.

What killed the DT&I section was it was basically a birdge railroad as well. It bridged the southern railroads (L&N, Southern) with the Detroit auto industry.

When GT took over both the D&TSL and the DT&I, things were changing. The mergers between Seaboard System and Chessie were soon to happen, as well as N&W and Southern. When those happened the importance of the DT&I really weakened. The GT purchased what turned out to be a less than ideal property for the current climate. The change in railroad climate caused traffic to shift from the DT&I to a single or double route (CN-NS, CN-CSX instead of the bridge route). As that traffic erroded, the need for the spending money on upkeep of the DT&I erroded as well. That was what ultimately killed the DT&I, and resulted in its eventual spinoff to become the IORY.

The only reason the D&TSL hasn't suffered the same fate is the online power plants. I had heard rumors that CN was looking at selling off the Shoreline Subdivision, but I don't see that happening.

It's sad, but the DT&I remained an independent railroad too long and went to places that weren't really needed in today's railroad economy most of it's life.

The loss of customers was a result of economics and changing structure of America more than it was a result of the work by the crews that serviced industries along the way.

[MSchwiebert]

I mostly agree with these points, was the former DT&I a victim of the changing railroad landscape - without a doubt, on the other hand the GTW could/should have seen the the "winds of change" and began the transition of the property from a bridge route that became redundant by merger created single owner routes by maintaining/growing the online traffic base - i.e. Campbell's Soup, which even in a reduced stature would have contributed to the bottom line, (say inbound canstock, and raw materials - understandably the outbound product was pretty well doomed by changes in the grocery supply food chain) - but they did not.
I agree that the DT&I should have been part of a merger/acquisition well before the Trunk ended up with it - it was certainly a case of 'missed opportunities'. For example, the DT&I could have been the line that tied the "original" N&W and the Wabash/Nickel Plate together in 1964 - instead of the PRR from Columbus to Sandusky - but PennCo kept the DT&I. Or if any of the other carriers that were bidding for it at the time of the GTW acquisition would have ended up with it, or if earlier the PC and the DT&I could have made the Detroit-St. Louis routing via Quincy work, or more recently if CSX had ended up with it instead of the I&O there were/are synergies in all of those instances that were flat out missed by the GTW 'winning' in the early 1980's.

I still believe that the advantages of the north end (XN north) - bypassing Toledo, limited cross traffic to deal with and online traffic sources (Delta and if what is supposed to happen at Leipsic happens) will either strengthen it's value to RailAmerica, or make it an attractive acquisition for another carrier - even either of the eastern class 1's.
I guess the Grand Trunk era could have been worse - they could have torn up more than what they did, but they weren't the greatest caretaker of the line either.

I have a couple comments.

First, the additional traffic for the M&W would be good for the railroad, if the railroad would be able to support it.

Second, in regards to the GT ownership of the DT&I. GTW was an odd railroad back in the 1980's. They were nothing more than a bridge railroad back then between the CN (who owned them) and the railroads in Chicago and Detroit.

What killed the DT&I section was it was basically a birdge railroad as well. It bridged the southern railroads (L&N, Southern) with the Detroit auto industry.

When GT took over both the D&TSL and the DT&I, things were changing. The mergers between Seaboard System and Chessie were soon to happen, as well as N&W and Southern. When those happened the importance of the DT&I really weakened. The GT purchased what turned out to be a less than ideal property for the current climate. The change in railroad climate caused traffic to shift from the DT&I to a single or double route (CN-NS, CN-CSX instead of the bridge route). As that traffic erroded, the need for the spending money on upkeep of the DT&I erroded as well. That was what ultimately killed the DT&I, and resulted in its eventual spinoff to become the IORY.

The only reason the D&TSL hasn't suffered the same fate is the online power plants. I had heard rumors that CN was looking at selling off the Shoreline Subdivision, but I don't see that happening.

It's sad, but the DT&I remained an independent railroad too long and went to places that weren't really needed in today's railroad economy most of it's life.

The loss of customers was a result of economics and changing structure of America more than it was a result of the work by the crews that serviced industries along the way.

[Y@]

So, I guess what I'll ask is, can somebody sum up what is going on with the MAW? Are they going to get this traffic or not? Sorry I really just don't have time to read through all this stuff and the articles.

[MSchwiebert]

Thumbnail sketch - MAW is getting money (again) from ORDC (Ohio Rail Development Commission) to fix a mile of track between Napoleon and Defiance where most of the derailments have occurred. Material salvaged after the rebuild could be used to build trackage for a facility in the Napoleon area that would enable the unloading of coal from hoppers into trucks to get to Campbell's for use in their boilers - if they can be convinced to do so.

So, I guess what I'll ask is, can somebody sum up what is going on with the MAW? Are they going to get this traffic or not? Sorry I really just don't have time to read through all this stuff and the articles.

[midland sub]

The N&W looked into acquiring the PRR's Morrow Secondary from Circleville west to at least Washington CH back in the late 1950's for the very same idea of connecting to the DT&I (but bypassing Summit Hill). I haven't read anything about the N&W wanting to acquire the DT&I at that point. The N&W and Chessie System ran an OCS over the DT&I back in 1977 as they explored jointly buying the line. I have a friend that has pics of the OCS heading north on the DT&I through Wash CH with DTI locos and the Chessie System Inspection cars- pretty neat stuff.

[Y@]

Thumbnail sketch - MAW is getting money (again) from ORDC (Ohio Rail Development Commission) to fix a mile of track between Napoleon and Defiance where most of the derailments have occurred. Material salvaged after the rebuild could be used to build trackage for a facility in the Napoleon area that would enable the unloading of coal from hoppers into trucks to get to Campbell's for use in their boilers - if they can be convinced to do so.

So, I guess what I'll ask is, can somebody sum up what is going on with the MAW? Are they going to get this traffic or not? Sorry I really just don't have time to read through all this stuff and the articles.

Thanks Mike, that helped!