(The following story by John D. Boyd appeared on the Journal of Commerce website on March 18, 2009.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Report shows nearly all carriers cut basic transport, maintenance jobs
Class I railroads as a group cut 1,678 jobs by mid-January from a month earlier, as the recession deepened and freight traffic remained sharply below year-earlier levels.
In new reports filed with the Surface Transportation Board, the seven biggest railroads in revenue and trackage said the cuts removed 1 percent of their total workforce from December’s already reduced levels, and left them down 2.1 percent from January 2008.
Bucking the trend was Union Pacific Railroad, whose workforce total of 50,305 is by far the largest contingent among the to-ranked carrier group and was up by about 1,350 from mid-December. But the others shed enough workers to bring the total down.
And since the timing of this report, railroads including UP have announced other layoffs, although carriers call most of these furloughs in hopes of putting the same workers back on the payroll when traffic picks up enough.
Out of 159,511 workers reported as of mid-January, the railroads said they lopped 2.76 percent off their single largest employment category — train and engine workers including conductors and locomotive engineers. That left the carriers with 63,187 such employees, down nearly 7 percent from a year earlier.
Railroads shed 1.4 percent of their track and structure maintenance crews during the month. That left 34,449, which was higher than at the same point in 2008.
In the latest month the Class Is also trimmed their equipment maintenance shop workforce, and the ranks of executives or assistants, but added some other administrative staff and non-train transport workers.
The STB report also puts the employment figures into an index going back two years, and January’s reading of 26.2 is the lowest index level in that period. Total Class I employment had topped 164,000 for several months in 2008 before traffic began to plummet after the financial storms struck in September.