#Ohio freights

[comeupkid415]

Finished two zines this week.

Lustin 4 A Rustin 3, 20 pages of Ohio freights

Burning Can 3: 20 full color pages of crushed garbage cans

Comment or message to purchase

[20th-century-railroading]

Illinois Central Gulf - Ash Street

A westbound ICG local freight approaches Ash Street crossing while a B&O transfer is on the connection track to the Santa Fe behind the tower, in April 1987.

[one-time-i-dreamt]

I got lost in an alternate universe version of Canton, Ohio and then got adopted by Nori Doorman after she found me in a Poppy Playtime-esque Harbor Freight.

[r0ttenb0gb0dy]

urm i never post IRL stuff on here but my patch jeans are finally like... wearable ..mmnn no more gigantic holes . i am Proud

[aryburn-trains]

PAT 6691 @ B&O Glenwood Shop (Ex-WAG 2300 Nee SP T&NO 365) Pittsburgh, PA May 3, 1981

[eopederson]

New York Central Railroad Freight Station, Junction of OH 37 with US 23, Delaware, OH, 1969.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

After Ohio rail disaster, Buttigieg is silent on restoring the safety standards Trump repealed

When a freight train carrying toxic chemicals derailed near East Palestine, Ohio, bursting into flame and sending up clouds of poisonous vinyl chloride smoke and gas, our immediate concerns were for the people in harm’s way and the train crew:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/04/us/train-derailment-fire-palestine-ohio.html

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/11/dinah-wont-you-blow/#ecp

But those immediate concerns were soon joined by a broader set of worries: that the entire rail industry presented a systematic danger, and the Ohio derailment was a symptom of a much deeper pathology that endangered anyone who lives near one of the rail corridors that crisscross America.

The rail industry is the poster child for corporate power, and rail barons were among the first targets of Gilded Age trustbusters who saw the rail monopolies as a threat to the prosperity and wellbeing of Americans, as well as the integrity of the American political system itself.

40 years of neoliberal “consumer welfare” antitrust — starting with Reagan and continuing through every administration since — has seen the American rail sector achieve levels of concentration that meet and exceed the corrupt, untenable degree of the late 19th century.

Like the original rail barons, the current crop (including the self-styled cuddly billionaire Warren Buffett), have gutted rail investment, skirted on safety, maimed and abused their workforce, smashed their unions, and placed the entire US supply chain in a state of brittle precarity:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/04/up-your-nose/#rail-barons

Like all monopolists, the rail industry has been able to capture its regulators, trampling evidence-based policy and replacing it with rules that benefit shareholders at the expense of the public, labor, and customers.

https://doctorow.medium.com/regulatory-capture-59b2013e2526

This regulatory capture is an inevitable consequence of market concentration. When an industry is composed of dozens of small- and medium-sized firms, they are unable to converge on a single story about which rules regulators should favor them with: some of those companies will want things the others don’t, and each will vie to produce evidence disconfirming the others’ claims.

But when an industry dwindles to a handful of cozy giants whose C-suites are stuffed with company-hopping executives who’ve done time at every major company in the sector, they converge on a single fairy tale about the best way to regulate their industry, and convert their regulators’ truth-seeking exercises into rigged auctions that they handily win:

https://locusmag.com/2022/03/cory-doctorow-vertically-challenged/

That’s what happened during the Trump years, when rail lobbyists secured the repeal of a long-overdue, hard-won safety regulation that would have required rail companies to replace the Civil-War-era brakes on their rolling stock with modern electronically controlled pneumatic brakes (ECPs):

https://jacobin.com/2023/02/rail-companies-safety-rules-ohio-derailment-brake-sytems-regulations

The repeal cost millions in lobbying dollars, but it was worth it. Shortly after the ECP rule was scrapped, Norfolk Southern handed millions in bonuses to its execs and did billions in stock buybacks, while laying offf thousands of workers:

https://www.fool.com/investing/2018/10/25/norfolk-southern-implements-massive-buyback-progra.aspx

Elections, we’re told, have consequences. After Biden won the 2020 presidential election, he made a string of excellent appointments — people like FTC chair Lina Khan, who hit the ground running with detailed plans for making sweeping, consequential changes that would blunt corporate power, reverse-Trump era abuses, and correct the dysfunctions that created a political base for Trump:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/party-its-1979-og-antitrust-back-baby

But other Biden appointees arrive in office with much less ambition. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has spent his tenure as King Log, failing to take action on spiraling airline cancellations, confining his major enforcement action to fining foreign airlines while ignoring the out-of-control abuses of America’s domestic carriers, except for the also-ran airline Frontier, which accounts for less than 2% of domestic travel:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/16/for-petes-sake/#unfair-and-deceptive

There are striking similarities between the structural defects in the airlines and the rail companies: both are highly concentrated sectors who have laid off senior staff, attacked unions, and blown billions in public money on stock buybacks and executive bonuses, even as their service degraded.

Both industries have been sharply criticized by experts and industry veterans, who’ve called for specific regulation. In the case of the airlines, SWA pilots and flight attendants had sounded the alarm about antiquated scheduling systems; for the rail companies, it’s experts like Grady Cothen, formerly a top safety expert at the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), who told Congress that without action on braking systems, “[there] will be more derailments, more releases of hazardous materials, more communities impacted”:

https://www.congress.gov/event/117th-congress/house-event/LC69424/text?s=1&r=9

Despite these warnings, and despite the near-misses and smaller disasters that led up to the 100-foot-tall fireball over Ohio, Buttigieg’s DOT has not moved to reinstate the Obama-era brake safety rule, deferring to the monopoly rail owners self-serving claim that there is no need for such a move:

https://jacobin.com/2023/02/department-of-transportation-train-brake-regulation-ohio-derailment/

Indeed, the FRA is currently considering a rule that would further weaken braking rules, reducing obligations to inspect, test and certify braking systems:

https://www.regulations.gov/document/FRA-2019-0072-0005

The rail labor unions — the best source of independent expertise on the daily operation of the freight system — say that this would be a disaster: “Following through with a final rule would only deliver yet another financial windfall to rail carriers by eliminating inspections, testing and repairs, and deferring routine maintenance”:

https://www.goiam.org/news/territories/tcu-union/carmen-division-tcu/rail-labor-files-joint-comments-on-fras-nprm-2/

Serving as Transportation Secretary to the President of the United States of America makes you one of the most powerful people in the history of the human race. The Secretary’s powers, while not unlimited, are extensive. The American people need a DoT that works for them, not one that weakens safety rules:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

Image: Gage Skidmore (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pete_Buttigieg_January_2020.jpg

CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

James St John (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/jsjgeology/27110172823/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

This week (Feb 13–17), I’ll be in Australia, touring my book Chokepoint Capitalism with my co-author, Rebecca Giblin. We’re doing a remote event for NZ tomorrow (Feb 13). Next are Melbourne (Feb 14), Sydney (Feb 15) and Canberra (Feb 16/17). More tickets just released for Sydney!

[Image ID: A locomotive steaming away from a nuclear explosion. The face of the logo has been replaced with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's, in the style of Thomas the Tank Engine.]

[dougielombax]

It’s been a year since that ghastly train derailment incident in Ohio.

What a shitshow!

This is what deregulation does!

[zponds]

Two days ago, I realeased a post showing my OCs from the Chesapeake & Ohio. Now this post will show my OCs from the railroad that was America’s first ever railroad and competed against the C&O for transporting people and goods, the…

Now these engines make up CSX’s Baltimore & Ohio heritage fleet…

and they can only be found in railroad territories that were once under the ownership of the Baltimore & Ohio. And these engines are…

Cincinnatian, the streamlined 4-6-2 P-7 #5301

Sapphire, the streamlined 4-6-2 P-7 #5304

George, the 4-6-2 P-7 #5315

Washington, the 4-6-2 P-7 #5309

Abraham, the 4-8-2 T-3a #5556

Lincoln, the 4-8-2 T-3b #5577

Theodore, the 2-8-8-4 EM-1 #7618

Roosevelt, the 2-8-8-4 EM-1 #7626

Luke, the EMD E7(a) #74

Charlie, the EMD E7(a) #1422

Itchy, the EMD E8(a) #1435

Sasha, the EMD F3 #83

Shirley, the EMD F3 #84(a)

Lulu, the EMD F7(a) #722

Gavin, the EMD GP7 #3400

Shira, the EMD GP9 #6604

[environmentalwatch]

Train Derailment in Ohio

Train Derailment Causes Environmental Distress

The train derailment in Ohio should be bigger news than it is, as fish continue to die in a spreading radius around the fire but people are told it’s safe to go home. Late on February 3rd, a freight train belonging to Norfolk Southern derailed in the middle of East Palestine, Ohio, a town of about 4700 people. Five of the 38 cars that came off the tracks contained vinyl chloride, a toxic and…

[artisticdivasworld]

Everything Changes, Even Trucking

It’s no secret that our industry is changing at lightning speed, and adapting to these changes is key to staying on top. One of the biggest shifts we’re seeing is the rise of technology in trucking. From route optimization to automated loading systems, tech is becoming a huge part of our daily lives on the road. Embracing this technology can feel overwhelming, but it’s crucial for staying…

[comeupkid415]

My Flickr finally broke 10million views. Thanks to everyone that’s stuck around, I mean even if I had 0 views I’d still be posting pics, buts yeah…. Check out the Flickr if you haven’t yet, way more content than this tumblr

[20th-century-railroading]

Nickel Plate Road 1500hp FM H12-44 No.153 built 4/58 one of twenty-two (134-155) owned by the NKP. Number 153 was in yard service at Toledo, Ohio on August 2, 1963. Photo by Howard Ameling

[1-westproductions]

NS EB Mix, NS Fostoria District, Oil Siding, OH, 9/2023. We later captured more train material at Bellevue, OH for a new upcoming Modern Train Video Release soon.

www.1westproductions.com

[aryburn-trains]

B&O 9941 At Brunswick

Baltimore & Ohio Budd RDC #9941 idles at the roundhouse in Brunswick Yard, Brunswick MD, July 29, 1977.

[eopederson]

Freight Rail Warehouse, Columbus, Ohio, 1969.