(The following story by Jim Stafford appeared on The Oklahoman website on June 11.)
OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. — A spokesman for the Union Pacific railroad Tuesday identified the shortline railroad that serves grain elevators in southwestern Oklahoma as the bottleneck that delayed delivery this spring of railcars for up to 10 days.
“The basic issue is the shortline that we work with there, which is a good partner, does not have the capacity to take a lot of cars for loading, and then release them and we move them out,” said Joe Adams, Union Pacific spokesman for the region that includes Texas and Oklahoma.
That shortline partner is the Wichita, Tillman and Jackson line that runs from Wichita Falls, Texas, to Altus and serves several grain elevators along the way.
Most trains loaded with grains are at least 80 to 90 cars, Adams said. That limits options for a shortline operator such as the Wichita, Tillman and Jackson that may lack siding to accommodate extra cars.
“They do not have the capacity to hold a number of trains on their railroad that we can then take when they are loaded,” Adams said. “It’s kind of a one-in, one-out situation.
Background to problem
There has been no shortage of railcars or equipment, Adams said. It remains a problem of infrastructure and lack of track to hold cars along the shortline.
However, Wichita, Tillman and Jackson spokesman Martin Sicalla said that rail traffic on the main line from the Gulf to Wichita Falls can cause delays that back the system up.
“Once a train gets to moving from Corpus Christi, everything has to fall in place for it to get here in a decent time,” Sicalla said. “We can point the finger all day long and blame everybody. The (Union Pacific) has worked with me very well this year, to be honest with you. They have done an excellent job.”
Comments by the railroads did not satisfy Mike Cassidy, president of Cassidy Grain in Frederick, who fumed for more than a week as he waited for the first delivery of railcars during the harvest. He needed 500 to handle more than 2 million bushels of grain and received 60 on Sunday, 10 days after they were scheduled he said.
The situation is similar for points all long the WTJ line, Cassidy said. Grain elevators were filled beyond capacity and forced to store wheat on open ground while waiting for railcars to ship it to major grain terminals at the Gulf and other points.
“My question would be, Why does nearly every location on his line have wheat on the ground?” Cassidy said.
The WTJ operates on a line on which the maximum speed limit is 10 miles per hour, Sicalla said. That means that cars shipped out of Wichita Falls on the line would take six hours to reach Frederick, which is about 60 miles northwest of the Texas city.
“That’s one of the things the state government might look at,” Adams said. “They need to reinvest in what we call light density line. I know the state of Oklahoma is looking at that. We’re suddenly seeing more demand on the nation’s rail system. While the main lines are in pretty good shape, there is lots of capital needs on the short lines.”
All the players in the system — grain elevator operators and railroads — need to hold talks to better prepare for next year’s harvest, Cassidy said.
“We need to get together between now and next harvest not to lay blame but to constructively discuss what can be done differently to improve the flexibility of the rail system,” he said.