US grain and feed shippers want rail regulators help fix "significant rail service disruptions" that have delayed deliveries, forcing some flour mills to shut down.
"Rail customers are not being adequately served," the National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA) told the Surface Transportation Board (STB) in a 24 March letter.
Complaints from NGFA's members have focused on service by western railroads Union Pacific (UP) and BNSF and eastern carrier Norfolk Southern (NS). CSX has had service issues over the past year, but "the outcry right now is more significant for the other three railroads," NGFA said.
To prod the carriers to bring their service up to an "acceptable level," the group wants regulators to direct the railroads to provide weekly service updates. NGFA is also looking further out, requesting that the railroads be required to file annual "service assurance plans" to help avoid future disruptions. While the service problems have had multiple causes, the disruptions are "much more drastic and prolonged" because the railroads have adopted the precision scheduled railroading model, while also cutting crew numbers, NGFA said.
BNSF said that during the last few months its operations were disrupted by frequent extreme weather and service interruptions, combined with ongoing global supply chain disruptions, that strained resource availability and reduced productivity and railcar inventory. BNSF has instituted an "aggressive program to restore service to the level our customers expect."
UP is "committed to supporting our customers and moving forward together amid the ongoing supply chain and labor challenges, which we are actively working to address," the railroad said today.
NS declined to comment.
Some NGFA members have shut flour and feed mills and halted sales because grain trains were not delivered. Rail problems required another NGFA member to spend an extra $3mn on secondary freight in the last month to try and keep animals fed because of missed train deliveries.
