From STB, Another NPRM

Written by William C. Vantuono, Editor-in-Chief
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The Surface Transportation Board on April 29 issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), URCS Data Reporting (Docket No. EP 769), “to codify a longstanding voluntary practice of data reporting by the Class I carriers,” which through the Association of American Railroads (AAR) have annually reported tare weight and L&D (loss and damage) data for use in the Board’s Uniform Railroad Costing System (URCS).

“In addition to formalizing this practice, the NPRM would allow the Class I carriers a choice of whether to provide tare weight and L&D data through AAR or file the data individually,” STB said. “The decision recognizes AAR’s longstanding voluntary practice to provide annually tare weight and L&D data.  The Board proposes a rule to formalize that reporting requirement to ensure continued availability of the data.”

In 1989, STB predecessor Interstate Commerce Commission adopted URCS as its general purpose costing system. The Board noted it “uses URCS for a variety of regulatory functions, including rate reasonableness and abandonment proceedings, to provide the railroad industry and shippers with a standardized costing model, to cost the Board’s Carload Waybill Sample to develop industry cost information, and to provide interested parties with basic cost information regarding railroad operations.”

Comments on the NPRM are due by June 13, 2022; replies aredue by June 28, 2022.

More information about URCS data is located on the Board’s website here. The NPRM URCS Data Reporting, Docket No. EP 769, can be downloaded below:

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