THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 16, 1995 TAG: 9504150323
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHRISTOPHER DINSMORE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 119 lines
Boxcars.
The word conjures images of commerce and American folklore. Boxcars once carried just about everything along the nation's steel-rail highways, from manufactured goods to cattle, from farm products to hobos.
Once the backbone of the nation's railroads, boxcars have slowly faded from the American landscape. Indeed, the fortunes of the railroads parallel the fortunes of the boxcar.
Both became less important over the past 75 years. Just as boxcars played a smaller role in the railroads, the railroads became less significant to the nation's transportation network, losing cargo to trucks and planes.
Until recently, that is.
Railroads are making a comeback, and perhaps the boxcar is as well. Railroads' share of the nation's cargo transportation, which fell through most of this century, improved in 1994. Rail market share grew as the railroads became more competitive with trucks plying the nation's congested highway system.
Boxcars, more than any other type of rail freight car, lost out to trucks, which could move the same goods faster and more directly. The rise of intermodalism - the use of containers that can be transferred between ships, trucks and rail cars - also took a bite out of boxcar use.
``Our boxcar business, as well as the industry's boxcar business, has declined over the years as we lost business to trucks and as we shifted commodities from boxcars to intermodal,'' said Dave Childress, director of paper, clay and forest products for Norfolk Southern Corp. ``But that's stabilized. Boxcar loadings have increased slightly in the past year or so.''
The rebounding economy has bolstered demand for the products that boxcars are still ideally suited for moving - heavy commodities such as rubber or rolls of paper. ``Heavy bulk commodities like paper are the future'' for boxcars, Childress said.
Boxcars still attract their share of uninvited freight. The railroad doesn't like to talk about it, but hobos and thrill-seekers still hop a train every now and then. The railroad discourages it, however, and has its own police to arrest trespassers. This may sound adventurous, but riding the rail can be fatal, and often is.
Norfolk Southern has 14,000 boxcars in its fleet, which generate more than $200 million in annual revenues. They carry newsprint, scrap paper, wood pulp, lumber, brick and brown paper used in making cardboard boxes. The Norfolk-based railroad serves about 50 paper mills throughout the Southeast with boxcars.
The railroad delivers rubber, plywood and particle board shipped through its general cargo piers in Norfolk with boxcars. The rubber is shipped from Indonesia, unloaded at Lambert's Point Docks and shipped by rail to Goodyear Tire and other rubber-product plants.
Rubber is shipped on pallets and in metal baskets that weigh more than a ton each. The typical 50- to 52-foot-long boxcar can handle up to 70 tons of cargo. A truck chassis is limited to about 20 tons, so the boxcar makes better use of its space.
Still, the future of the boxcar is uncertain. ``We have a genuine concern about the future of the boxcar,'' Childress said.
For many years, the biggest problem was that there were simply too many boxcars. Such underused assets put a drag on railroad earnings.
Norfolk Southern has shrunk its fleet of boxcars from nearly 40,000 in 1982 to about 14,000 today. Railroads nationwide have reduced the total number of boxcars to about 55,000 in 1993 from about 273,000 in 1979, according to the Association of American Railroads.
Boxcars are also no longer very profitable, and the fleet is aging. The average age of Norfolk Southern's fleet is 23 years. They can last more than 40 years with maintenance and rebuilding, but still they're getting old.
``They will be difficult to replace at current freight rates,'' Childress said.
If it's possible to replace them at all. They were so abundant that no rail car manufacturer has made a significant production run of boxcars since before 1985, said Carol Perkins, spokeswoman for the railroad association. Made out of steel, they cost about $45,000 a copy in 1980.
A boxcar makes an industry average of 13.5 loaded trips a year. Norfolk Southern boxcars average less than that - 12 to 13 trips a year.
``We need to improve boxcar productivity and utilization,'' Childress said.
Many cars sit empty in rail yards or at plants just waiting. The average length of a trip has nearly doubled in the past 25 years as well, which means cars are on the road longer and may have to be switched between railroads, a time-consuming process.
The industry has established a boxcar task force to study the issue and make recommendations. The task force is made up of representatives from major railroads, boxcar leasing companies, paper companies and other users.
It aims to improve usage industrywide to 18 trips a year by 1998.
``At Norfolk Southern we have a goal that's even higher than that,'' said Childress, a member of the task force. Norfolk Southern wants its boxcars to be taking two trips a month by 2000.
``That's going to take a monumental effort from both us and our customers,'' he said.
Customers can help by loading and unloading the cars more quickly to get them back into the system and by helping to keep them clean. ``We're getting more of a buy-in from them on that,'' Childress said.
Norfolk Southern will spend an average of $7,800 a car maintaining its boxcar fleet in 1995.
Last year it modified 161 cars by raising their inside height so customers such as paper mills can get more efficient use of the cars by adding another layer of paper rolls. Another 144 cars will be modified this year.
The railroad has also begun testing a spring system to protect the commodities better on trips.
``We're getting leaner and meaner, and hopefully better,'' Childress said. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
MARTIN SMITH-RODDEN/Staff
A Norfolk Southern boxcar loaded with Goodyear rubber sits at
Lambert's Point Docks. The railroad has about 14,000 boxcars in its
fleet; they carry newsprint, scrap paper, wood pulp, lumber, brick
and brown paper.
Photo
MARTIN SMITH-RODDEN/Staff
Longshoremen load a boxcar at Lambert's Point Docks.
by CNB