CP/DM&E Split Noise

[Nahant]

It looks like there is noise coming out of CP that they believe they paid too much for DM&E and are now considering selling it off.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/02/07/bloomberg_articlesLYZRSY6JTSEC01-LZ1MA.DTL

[trainboysd40]

What you don't seem to know is that there is a lot of drama going on in CP, and what Bill Ackman says cannot be considered CP's opinion. Ackman and his investment group bought something like 12% of CP, and immediately starting stirring stuff up. This is just his latest 'thing'. When CP bought DME there was a bidding war with CN, so this whole thing is just Ackman being a dick.

[GE85 tonner]

you took the words right out of my mouth

[crazytiger]

This is some of the stupidity from Hunter Harrison, the guy Ackman wants at CEO.

"Everyone at Canadian National understood what we were trying to do, which was provide quality service for customers. So we designed a good service. We concluded that good service is doing what you say you are going to do. No. 2, good service means controlling costs — not slash and burn, but control. There is a delicate balance between service and cost control. Next, get no one hurt. Finally, the foundation of all this is people — leadership that can institute those changes." -- Hunter Harrison

Put plainly, that is...
1. Customers
2. Low Costs
3. Safety
4. People

And this guy thinks he knows how to run a railroad? Come on! Who wants to work for a company, railroad company, no less, that safety is the third priority? I'm not saying I *do* know how to run a railroad, but I can tell you that this is how *not* to run a railroad. Let's just hope that he doesn't get a hold of CP.

[JRMDC]

Well, I don't know the details of Harrison's career, at CN or elsewhere, but he seems to have built a highly favorable reputation. Perhaps it is a list that simply counts the major categories of things that need to be done, rather than ranks them? Maybe the use of the work "next" means next on the list rather than a lower priority?

At any rate, CN's profitability soared during his time, as I recall, and I don't recall CN getting a reputation for being unsafe. Correct me if I am wrong.

Here's something I just found: http://business.financialpost.com/2011/12/30/activist-investor-courting-former-cn-ceo-hunter-harrison-to-lead-cp/

Ackman is a separate issue and I know nothing of him.

[trainboysd40]

Janusz, I'm afraid I'm going to have to correct the hell out of you.
After Harrison took over CN, things changed. A lot. The ONLY thing that got better was operating ratio and shareholder value. Harrison did a lot of things to give more money to investors, including deferring maintenance, running badly marshaled, too long trains, working employees for every hour he could and abolishing crew districts, and creating a culture of fear that punished employees for the most minor of mistakes while letting any accident caused by a cost-cutting measure slide for years, even when directly called out in a Transport Canada report.]
Have 4 examples...
1: Lake Wabamun, Alberta: Deferred maintenance causes a derailment, sending millions of gallons of oil into the lake and killing hundreds of thousands of birds, ruining the lake for years.
2: 2 days later (And this is the one that gets me the most) CN derailed caustic chemicals into the Cheakamus River in BC, devastating the river, because they threw all of BC Rail's old operational practices out the window. This particular train had something like 120 cars, no DPU, and empties marshaled ahead of loads, on a 2.2% grade with 12 degree curves. SMART. They didn't stop this practice for some time until Transport Canada forced them to.
3: Also BC Rail, near Lillooet, they decided that a single non-DB locomotive would be fine running down a very long 2.2% grade. The entire train crew was killed.
4: Prince George, BC: Running out of engineers, CN substitutes poorly trained management to operate a remote control yard job, as is common practice for them. It collides with a mainline train, spilling more oil into the Fraser River.

These are just ones I'm quoting from memory. CN has a horrible reputation for safety, thanks to Harrison, and you can only ignore it by reading exclusively financial news.

[JRMDC]

At any rate, CN's profitability soared during his time, as I recall, and I don't recall CN getting a reputation for being unsafe. Correct me if I am wrong.

Janusz, I'm afraid I'm going to have to correct the hell out of you.

Correction accepted!

But, actually, I wasn't completely wrong, profit did soar, and I am absolutely 100% correct in saying "I don't recall" CN being unsafe. I didn't, and I don't! Wow, pretty much accurate post by me. :) :) :) Awesome!

[trainboysd40]

Shoosh, you.

[trainmaster_1]

Matt, only the engineer survived the wreckage, the conductor and brakeman were the only two crew members killed unfortunately. If you want to read about the runaway here's a link to it.

http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-reports/rail/2006/r06v0136/r06v0136.pdf

[GE85 tonner]

well customer service sucks too we have a customer who load 8 cars a day, CN can't find anuff cars some weeks to keep ,we get 3 or 4 for the day then the next week i'm trying to find room to put them all.Mind ya it has worked out good for us as we are leasing them 32 TRLX flats and we've got the contract to install stakes on them

http://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk200/scooby19784/stevesphone072.jpg