Almost? Why almost? Well, because a) we cannot engineer all the risk out of the railroad. Anytime we put one or more objects in motion in either the same or opposing directions we are b) always in the business of properly managing the cumulative risks.
Managing risk is the business of railroading. Engineering is almost as important. Regardless of the quality, or the limits to the quality, of the engineering, responsibility for safe train operations rests, and not easily, on the operating officers.
Those of you who know me know how much I enjoy telling and retelling the story of a certain Union Army general who attempted to contravene the orders of a trainmaster when the railroads were charged with the task of moving the Army of the Potomac west to Tennessee to relieve the Army of the Cumberland at Chattanooga.
The general threatened to have the trainmaster court-martialed if he did not do as the general ordered. The trainmaster was no fool and telegraphed the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton. Secretary Stanton advised the general that should the general persist in his actions, his commission was forfeited and he would face court-martial.
Now Stanton isn’t quite the hero to me that Thaddeus Stevens is, but I would have happily worked for him on his railroad, and happily had him work for me on my railroad.
We do a lot by committee on the railroad. We investigate and determine the cause of derailment by committee. We review accidents and injuries by committee. We institute programs to prevent accidents and injuries by committee. But even when doing things by committee, we require the operating officer to exercise leadership within the committee.
The point being?
The point being that if we require the expertise of the operating officers to reconcile the service plan with the limits of the engineered configuration of the railroad, then maybe we should have the operating officers involved in the design and build processes in order to review that engineered configuration and reconcile it with the needs of safe train operation.
Let’s suppose, for example, we are rehabilitating a section of railroad that has an eight-degree curve allowing a maximum train speed of 30 mph, and the curve connects two sections of tangent track with a maximum speed of 80 mph.
At the design stage of the project, the (non-locomotive) engineers intend to abate this curve, allowing an operating speed of 60 mph. But you know and I know that engineering is all about doing the most you can with the least expenditure, and as costs mount in the build stage, somebody does some pencil and paper math and says, “Uh, about that curve: Reducing the curvature to allow 60 mph, is going to cost $4 million. And that $4 million only buys you a 90-second reduction in trip time.”
Now, what’s 90 seconds to a four-hour trip? Less than 1%. Is it worth it? Everybody’s head shakes “no,” and everybody thinks he or she is making the smart operating decision.
So the curve isn’t abated. But the decision isn’t one of simply trading time for money. The operating officer’s analysis is the analysis of risk, so the operating officer says, “We can trade time for money, but we are still obligated to establish the equivalent improvement in safety for the operation that abating the curve would provide. We need to reduce the risk of overspeed derailment in the same proportion that abating the degree of curvature would reduce that risk.”
Now, the heads might stop shaking, or they might not, but the operating officer’s risk analysis continues:
“We can install an automatic enforcement system to prevent the risk of overspeed.”
If the heads continue to shake, the operating officer moves to the next method of providing equivalent safety: “We must strengthen the training and qualification of the engine and train crews that are going to operate the service. Safe train operations cannot be jeopardized by lack of familiarity, or ‘loss of situational awareness.’ We need to spend some money on the best training, using the best methods, with the best materials and the best trainers.”
Then the operating officer says, “In addition, we need to have a qualified supervisor in the locomotive cab on every run until all the locomotive engineers have demonstrated their qualification in live, revenue service.”
If the heads continue to shake, the operating officer points out that you don’t spend $180 million to restore a railroad; you don’t spend $4 million dollars each on new locomotives; you don’t spend $1.5 million each on new coaches, and place that all in jeopardy, at risk, by nickel-and-diming your training of the crews who have to operate those locomotives and those cars over that railroad. That’s just poor engineering and worse operating.
And if the designers, builders, overseers and budgeters keep shaking their heads? Then the operating officer needs to pull a Stanton.
David Schanoes is Principal of Ten90 Solutions LLC, a consulting firm he established upon retiring from MTA Metro-North Railroad in 2008. David began his railroad career in 1972 with the Chicago & North Western, as a brakeman in Chicago. He came to New York 1977, working for Conrail’s New Jersey Division. David joined Metro-North in 1985. He has spent his entire career in the operating division, working his way up from brakeman to conductor, block operator, dispatcher, supervisor of train operations, trainmaster, superintendent, and deputy chief of field operations. “Better railroading is 10% planning plus 90% execution,” he says. “It’s simple math. Yet, we also know, or should know, that technology is no substitute for supervision, and supervision that doesn’t utilize technology isn’t going to do the job. That’s not so simple.”
