ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, January 24, 1997 TAG: 9701240065
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
Norfolk Southern Corp. plans to increase its capital spending this year nearly 12 percent, to $792million, NS Chairman David Goode announced Thursday.
The capital budget is used for improving items expected to last a long time, such as buildings, track and equipment. Part of the money will go toward an ongoing program at Norfolk Southern's Roanoke Car Shops in which new bodies are put on coal cars.
The railroad has budgeted enough money to rebuild 2,000 coal cars this year, or 12 per workday. The rate is down from 14 per day, or 3,500, in 1995, but that reduction has had no impact on employment in the shops, where 1,159 people work.
The car rebodying program began in April 1988; so far, 23,227 cars have been rebuilt, NS said.
The largest chunk of the capital spending, $240 million, is for replacement of rail, crosstie, track bed and bridges. More than $100 million will go to an automotive mixing center network that NS is developing for Ford Motor Co. under a 12-year contract.
Other planned expenditures include $144 million for locomotives; $95 million for freight cars, including 324 multilevel auto carriers; and $11 million for projects at North American Van Lines, an NS subsidiary.
In an unrelated announcement Thursday, Conrail, the Northeastern railroad sought by both Norfolk Southern and CSX Corp. of Richmond, reported the official results of last Friday's vote by Conrail shareholders on a measure that would have cleared the way for the proposed CSX-Conrail merger. The count showed that 65 percent of all shares voted were against the measure that would have permitted CSX to purchase more Conrail stock, effectively locking NS out of its attempt to acquire Conrail.
Of the approximately 77 million shares voted, about 49.9 million voted against opting out of a Pennsylvania statute to permit the CSX purchase. Another 26.8 million voted for the plan, and 313,066 voted to abstain.
The votes against the measure, whose approval is integral to the October merger agreement signed by CSX and Conrail, included 29 percent of the shares in Conrail's employee stock ownership plan, NS said. Ninety-two percent of the Conrail shares - not including the shares already owned by CSX and by Conrail management - voted against the proposal, NS said.
The size of the vote and support of Conrail employees refutes claims that large institutional investors defeated the proposal, NS Chairman David Goode said.
Finally, NS spokesman Bob Auman reported Thursday that 50 jobs were transferred from Chattanooga, Tenn., on Jan. 6 to Norfolk Southern's Roanoke Locomotive Shops.
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