[First let me say I am not judging anyone here.] I just read an article that said UP was asked to divert and reroute all HazMat loads away from the Olympics in Salt Lake. UP refused, sparking anger from the COALITION FOR A SAFE OLYMPICS, the UTAH OLYMPIC PUBLIC SAFETY COMMAND, and UDOT. Any comments from UP fans? UP did give in and rerouted the nasty stuff away from the Olympics. It's understandable that safety was an issue as well as who know how many trains UP had to shift. Not good for the railroad other than good PR. But after 9/11..................
Sounds like someone was suffering from an anal-cranial inversion combined with an unhealthy dose of paranoia! Do you know who asked the UP to Divert?
Well, it was the above-mentioned groups. This was from TEAMSTERS magazine so it's correct. Seems like it may have been kept quiet. I don't blame UP for not wanting to divert thousands of cars of hazardous stuff, nor the Olympic people for being paranoid about it either. This was published in a magazine that reaches a lot of folks like myself.......... Just never heard it before.
Is this the article you read? Link to Teamsters Article If so, I think you should be informed of the motivation behind this situation. I assume that you are a member of the Teamsters, so I will do my best to explain the situation without being insulting. For the record, I too am a union member (SEIU, an affiliate of the AFL/CIO), but there are many things that unions do politically that I consider to be bordering on blackmail or extortion. This situation is one that I feel falls into that category, using 9/11 as a convenient way of hiding the true intentions of the demands. Having read the article at the above link, I completely understand that the Teamsters were instrumental in forcing the UP to divert traffic around the Salt Lake area during the Olympics with no regard for the shipping delays and additional cost incurred by the UP. The statement that "all other HAZMAT transporters were addressing similar safety concerns" is unfair to the railroads, as the shipping options for "other" transporters (read: Teamsters Truckers) are simply using a road or highway detour of a few extra miles, while rail detours around the area amount to hundreds of miles of rerouting through either the Pacific Northwest or the Sunset line. I guarantee that behind the scenes, the Teamsters negotiated with the committees to allow their trucks to continue to haul hazmat cargo with restrictions on the amounts they could haul. It would be interesting to find out how originating hazmat shipments in the Salt Lake area were shipped out during the Olympics while the UP was unable to service their customers (Trucks?). What would be interesting to read would be the costs UP absorbed to reroute trains during the Olympics, and also statistics showing the increase of small OTR shipments of HazMat out of the SLC/Ogden area during the Olympics. Needless to say, the industries that ship and receive HazMat in the area didn't shut down for 3 weeks. Also quoted in the article is a sensationally ridiculous statistic from Railwatch, quoted as a "nonprofit public education organization". Truth be told, Railwatch is an organization funded by the trucking lobby and labor organizations with interests in the trucking industry (like the Teamsters). They use statistics like "there is a train accident every 90 minutes in this country" as a way to scare people without explaining that a railcar derailing one axle in a yard is considered a "train accident" for statistical purposes. Their website used to have a list of organizations and supporters, but the list mysteriously disappeared when the elected officials on the list were found to be the largest recipient of campaign funds from the Trucking lobby. My apologies for preaching on this item, but too often I see discussions like this one become something that paints railroads as monsters. If you want to see where my defensiveness comes from, go to "railwatch.org" and read their propaganda that demonizes the rail industry. Truth be told, I would like to see the truck and rail industries work together to make transportation safer and more efficient. But as organizations like Railwatch exist, there will never be cooperation.
....not to mention Hazmat shipments with Salt Lake as the destination, or did all the gas stations in town run dry??? A problem over here (and it seems in the US too) is that there seems to be no unified voice for the rail industry, nobody to talk up it's side of the story, versus lots of misinformation, both deliberate & unintentional, and most of the railroad companies seem determined to do whatever it takes to keep out of the public eye...
Thanks for the excellent commentary on the issue Kevin. Thank heaven the unions in the UK do not wield anything like the power they once did, although key unions in something like the rail industry can still wreak havok, often without full justification. I agree with Martyn, that the railroads should be more up front, and speak with a unified voice to stand up to the dis-information fed to the public. Statistics can be made to mean almost anything, in unscrupulous hands!
Kevin, I agree. The Teamsters are not my favorite people and I am not all the thrilled about being one either. This is the first union I have been in where I've been without a contract for over 2 years. And stuff more too.......... That's beside the point anyway. But, one thing I didn't mention is that the BLE are considering joining the Teamsters too! In a nut shell it seems that everyone bullies the railroads when it benefits them. I'll check that link to the article, just have to move fast and get chores done. BRB.
