GHY Tradelines

(Vanessa Lu — Toronto Star)

The federal government is wading into a long-standing dispute between freight shippers and the country’s biggest railways, threatening big fines for poor service.

Transport Minister Denis Lebel and Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz on Tuesday announced the introduction of a new bill that would give companies that ship goods by rail the right to a service agreement with railways. And it will create an arbitration process to establish an agreement when commercial negotiations fail.

“This bill will help shippers maintain and grow their businesses while ensuring that railways can manage an efficient shipping network for everyone,” Lebel said in a news release.

Both CN and CP argue such legislation is unnecessary and will stifle innovation. They argue there is no evidence of systemic performance issues that would warrant government intervention. Read more here.
 

(CargoNews Asia)

Looming legislation aimed at improving rail service for shippers in Canada could backfire and end up making the country’s sprawling rail networks less efficient, the chief executive of Canada’s biggest railroad warned, reported Reuters.

Canada’s Conservative government plans to introduce legislation this fall giving all shippers more clout in ensuring consistent rail service, and improve ways to resolve disputes. The rail companies are concerned that the legislation could end up dictating or imposing levels of service that don’t take into consideration existing commercial arrangements with customers.

Claude Mongeau, the CEO of Canadian National Railway, said the imposition of service obligations on rail companies might give relief to one unhappy shipper but that may come at the cost of upsetting service for others down the line as railroads are large, interconnected networks. Read more here.
 

(Bloomberg)

A boom in traffic at Canadian National Railways Co. (CNR) and Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. (CP), the country’s two largest rail companies, may mean Canada’s recovery will be buoyant even after economists and the Bank of Canada pared their outlook for growth this year.

Canadian freight volumes accelerated in the fourth quarter to their fastest pace in 2011 on a year-over-year basis, while commodity carloads were up 6.8 percent in December from November on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to data from the Association of American Railroads. Data from Statistics Canada showing stronger volumes in the August-October period also suggest future economic growth. Read more here.
 

(Cargonews Asia)

Canada’s two largest railroads warned that the federal government’s plans to increase its regulation of rail-shipping relationships beyond the scope of commercial agreements will hurt the industry and make it less competitive, reported Dow Jones Newswires.

At an event in Winnipeg, the Canadian government, in pre-election-campaign mode, said that it intends to implement the recommendations of a two-year study into the country’s rail freight supply chain that will give shippers more clout in ensuring consistent performance from rail operators.

The study, which focused on railway performance, involved consultations with 85 different stakeholders, including shippers, terminal operators, ports and vessel operators. An independent panel, chaired by Walter Paszkowski, released its interim report in October and submitted its final report to the government in late December. Read more here.

(Canadian Transportation & Logistics)

CN, the Montreal Port Authority (MPA) and the two companies that operate the port’s three key container terminals have announced two level of service agreements (LSAs) designed to drive a strong focus on supply chain efficiencies.

The two agreements – one signed by CN, the port authority and Montreal Gateway Terminals Partnership (MGT), which operates the CAST and RACINE terminals, and another signed by CN, the port authority and Termont Montreal – complement a framework agreement that CN and the MPA reached in September. Under last fall’s agreement, CN and the port decided to develop a best-practices vision for the gateway’s supply chain, improve productivity, and leverage these gains to increase their share of global container traffic. Read more here.

(Cargonews Asia)

Unionised workers at Canada’s two largest railways voted to strike if labour contract talks fail, reported Dow Jones Newswires.

The Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union said clerical, intermodal workers and shopcraft workers at Canadian National Railway (CN) voted overwhelmingly to strike. The strike deadline is midnight January 25. The CAW represents 3,400 CN clerical, intermodal and shopcraft employees and 575 owner-operators that work for CN’s trucking subsidiary, CNTL. The four groups are covered by three collective agreements with the union, CN said. Read more here.

pspan style=”FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-family:Arial;font-size:8;color:black;” span style=”font-size:85%;”(DC Velocity – Toby Gooley)/spanbr //spanspan style=”FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-family:Arial;font-size:10;color:black;” br /Canadian National Railway (CN), the Montreal-based railroad that has worked in recent years to improve productivity and shorten transit times, is extending that approach to its seaport partners through a series of new “service level agreements.”br /br /In addition to establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) and measurement tools, the agreements formalize the tracking, electronic sharing, and application of the resulting data, CN said.br /br /The aim of the service agreements is to increase coordination among the railroad, ports, terminal operators, and ocean carriers, according to Jean-Jacques Ruest, CN’s chief marketing officer. Ruest delivered the keynote address at the recent American Association or Port Authorities (AAPA) 99th Annual Convention in Halifax, N.S. Some 700 port professionals from throughout the Western Hemisphere attended the event. Read more a href=”http://www.dcvelocity.com/articles/20101001cn_new_intermodal_agreements/”span style=”color:#0000ff;”here/span/a.br style=”mso-special-character: line-break”br style=”mso-special-character: line-break”?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office” /o:p/o:p/span/ppb style=”mso-bidi-font-weight: normal”span style=”FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-family:Arial;font-size:10;color:black;” Related:/span/bspan style=”FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-family:Arial;font-size:10;color:black;” a href=”http://thechronicleherald.ca/Business/1205400.html” target=”_blank”span style=”color:#0000ff;”Let’s hope CN’s pact with Halifax port is a harbinger of improved service/span/a/spanbspan style=”FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-family:Arial;font-size:10;color:#ed1c2d;” o:p/o:p/span/b/p

p style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:8;” span style=”font-size:85%;”(Courtney Tower — BarCode Border)/span ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office” /o:p/o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” o:p/o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”b style=”mso-bidi-font-weight: normal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” CN Withdraws Work Rules Threato:p/o:p/span/b/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” A threatened strike or lockout in the Canadian National Railway system is off. Late Friday, a tentative three-year collective agreement was reached with 2,700 operating employees, who still must vote to ratify it.o:p/o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” o:p/o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” After a week of last-ditch negotiations in Montreal, CN withdrew demands to eliminate two sets of jobs and from its announced plan to impose new work rules on the workers starting Monday. Contract talks had broken off last spring in what a federal conciliation commissioner, in a scathing report blaming both sides, called an atmosphere of “dysfunctional” relations./spanspan style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” o:p /o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” CN briefly announced Friday night that it “will have labor stability with this group for the next three years,” but gave no details. However, Bryan Boechler, a spokesman for Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, representing the conductors, trainmen and switching yard workers, told The Bar-Code Border that CN’s imposition of new work rules was “off the table.” CN President Claude Mongeau had written to all these employees with this threat if the union would not agree to a new contract.o:p/o:p/span/pp style=”MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 10pt” class=”MsoNormal”span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%;font-family:’Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’;font-size:10;” Read more at a href=”http://www.barcodeborder.ca/”span style=”color:#0000ff;”The Bar-Code Border/span/a. o:p/o:p/span/p

span style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%; FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’; COLOR: black; FONT-SIZE: 8pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA”(Montreal Gazette)br //spanspan style=”LINE-HEIGHT: 115%; FONT-FAMILY: ‘Verdana’, ‘sans-serif’; COLOR: black; FONT-SIZE: 10pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-ansi-language: EN-CA; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA”br /The Montreal Port Authority and Canadian National Railway Co. said Monday they have signed a framework pact aimed at raising the port’s efficiency and boosting its share of cargo shipped between Europe and Ontario and the U.S. Midwest. CN will benefit by carrying more cargo onwards. Read more a href=”http://www.montrealgazette.com/business/Port+Authority+sign+pact+boost+efficiency+move+more+cargo/3585751/story.html”span style=”color:#0000ff;”here/span/a. /span

span style=”font-size:85%;”(Cargonews Asia)/spanbr /br /Canadian National Railway and the union representing 1,700 locomotive engineers will submit unresolved wage and benefits issues to binding arbitration after talks failed to yield a deal, Reuters reported.br /br /Canada’s largest railway resumed labour talks with the Teamsters union on December 3 after a brief strike. The company and union had agreed to put outstanding issues to binding arbitration if no agreement was reached.br /br /CN said talks ended on Saturday without a settlement. “The federal minister of labour will now appoint an arbitrator, who will have 90 days following his or her appointment to report to the minister with a final decision on a new collective agreement,” the company said in a statement. “Nothing precludes CN or the (union) from agreeing to further negotiations once the arbitration process starts.”br /br /The railway said no further strike action is permitted under the dispute resolution mechanism, nor can CN lock out the union.

(Journal of Commerce Online – John D. Boyd)br /br /strongRailroad acts quickly to resume normal operations/strongbr /br /Canadian National Railway was ramping its operations back up December 3 following a five-day strike by locomotive engineers, but it was not clear how long it would take Canada’s largest railroad to get back to full service. Industry sources had said during the strike that it would take at least several days to get all crews back on regular schedules and get train traffic back to a pre-strike pace. Read more a href=”http://www.joc.com/node/415047″here/a.

span style=”font-size:85%;”(NASDAQ – Ann Keeton, Dow Jones Newswires)/spanbr /br /Canadian National Railway Co. (CNI) is seeing steady monthly increases in business of 3% to 4%, causing Chief Executive Hunter Harrison to turn bullish for a gradual recovery for rail freight hauling. Still, he said, “I think it’s a confidence issue,” he told Dow Jones Newswires in an interview, adding that fear of spending and investing could derail a recovery.br /br /The head of the Montreal-based railroad company spoke Monday at a transportation symposium at Northwestern University. As railroads recover from a 20% downturn, they need to plan in the long term for adding capacity, he said.br /br /Expansion from adding track likely won’t happen, because that’s too costly, he said. But railroads could become more efficient through mergers, Harrison said. As well, railroads should consider “open access” for some markets, where customers could decide with which freight hauler they want to work. That railroad would pay fees for access to a competitor’s track. Read more a href=”http://www.nasdaq.com/aspx/stock-market-news-story.aspx?storyid=200911021758dowjonesdjonline000415amp;title=canadian-rail-chief-sees-freight-recoveryconfidence-issue”here/a.

span style=”font-size:85%;”(Today’s Trucking)/spanbr /br /Four out of six grain shippers have been vindicated in their cases against CN Railway, which they claim has not been providing a adequate and reasonable level of service for the movement of Western grain for crop in 2007 and 2008.br /br /The a href=”http://www.cta-otc.gc.ca/” target=”_blank”Canadian Transportation Agency /aruled that CN did not fail to meet its obligations under the Canada Transportation Act for services to a href=”http://www.cwb.ca/public/en/” target=”_blank”Canadian Wheat Board /aand Providence Grain Group Inc.br /br /However, the CTA did side with North East Terminal Ltd., Paterson Grain, Parrish and Heimbecker Limited, and North West Terminal Ltd. in similar complaints.br /br /“Our grain terminals are now struggling to get rail cars when we need them for our markets because CN’s program requirements have been so rigid and unworkable for us,” said GNP Transportation amp; Logistics manager Perry Pellerin. “As a result, none but the largest grain handlers with multiple elevators could fit within CN’s service model, which strongly favored those who can ship in large rail car blocks, week after week, to a single destination.”br /br /In its ruling, the quasi-judicial agency determined that a performance benchmark should be applied as a basis for determining whether CN is providing the shippers proper levels of service, including the confirmation of the number of rail cars requested by the shipper, as the timeliness and predictability of railcar delivery. Read more a href=”http://www.todaystrucking.com/news.cfm?intDocID=20386″here/a.

span style=”font-size:85%;”(Cargonews Asia)/spanbr /span style=”font-size:85%;”br //spanCanadian National Railway (CN) has inked a deal with the city of Joliet regarding CN’s proposed acquisition of the major portion of the Elgin, Joliet and Eastern Railway Company (EJamp;E).br /br //spanThe agreement resolves the concerns the city had related to quiet zones, operations, and communications surrounding the transaction.br /br /The conditions of the negotiations are contingent upon approval of CN’s proposal to acquire control of the EJamp;E, which is being considered by the federal Surface Transportation Board (STB).br /br /As stated in STB’s draft environmental impact statement, the board has encouraged voluntary agreements between CN and communities.br /br /CN has been actively engaged in the environmental review process and will participate in the public hearings later in the year.

span style=”font-size:85%;”(The Canadian Press/AFP)/spanbr /br /The federal government has ordered CN Rail to find and remove potentially faulty wheels from its trains.br /br /The emergency safety directive from Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon comes after the Transportation Safety Board warned thousands of wheel sets could cause derailments. Since 2000, 15 derailments due to loose wheels have been reported in Canada, and at least two in the United States, Canada’s TSB said.br /br /The potentially faulty wheel sets were assembled at a Canadian National’s Transcona wheel shop between April 1, 1998, and February 28, 2001. Of the 43,000 sets made in that period, up to 12,000 may remain in service in North America on some Canadian Pacific Railway, Canadian National Railway and U.S. freight cars.br /br /The Transport Department says the October 15 deadline gives CN the time needed to track all the wheels on train cars throughout Canada. In issuing the order, Cannon said he wants to prevent any future derailments related to faulty wheels.