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LONGVIEW, Wash. — UTU-represented train and engine employees of Columbia & Cowlitz Railroad here have a new employer in Patriot Rail Corp. after Patriot completed purchase of the shortline from paper manufacturer and forest products supplier Weyerhaeuser.

Also included in the sale is Weyerhaeuser Woods Railroad (a non-UTU property) that connects with Columbia & Cowlitz. The two are slated to be consolidated into one shortline by Patriot, a shortline holding company whose properties include UTU-represented Louisiana & North West Railroad.

UTU Assistant President Arty Martin has met four times in recent months with the UTU train and engine employees on Columbia & Cowlitz, and has assigned International Vice President Paul Tibbit to work in conjunction with General Chairperson Sean Kibbee to monitor the transfer of ownership, which includes protection of seniority and work assignments.

“As the nation’s largest rail union, the UTU has a long history of successful experience in processing grievances governed by the Railway Labor Act, and the UTU will work diligently on behalf of our Columbia & Cowlitz members to ensure a smooth and properly protected transition,” Martin said.

CHICAGO — At the BNSF Corwith intermodal yard here, the railroad has dumped a contractor and said it intends to hire its own workers to load and unload containers and trailers onto and off of flat cars, reports Chicago News Cooperative.

This comes after BNSF told many of the contractor’s 180 workers, represented by the Teamsters Union, that they were too fat, reports Chicago News Cooperative.

Although the same workers were invited to reapply for their jobs, a significant number were not, says Chicago News Cooperative. Among the reasons: They had too much body fat.

Some 30 of the workers not rehired told Chicago News Cooperative that BNSF said they ‘might’ be rehired if they lost weight.

Chicago News Cooperative said the new direct hires would be represented by the Transportation Communications Union (TCU).

One of the Teamsters, rehired by BNSF after losing 50 pounds, told Chicago News Cooperative: “Of course we’re big; we’re Teamsters. You grab your coffee and doughnuts — that’s what Teamsters do.”

BNSF declined to comment, citing potential litigation.

U.S. Class I railroad traffic continued its growth trend through the Christmas holiday week, reports the Association of American Railroads.

Carloads were up almost 30 percent versus the same holiday week in 2009, and intermodal (trailers and containers on flat cars) was up more than 25 percent versus the same holiday week in 2009.

The AAR reported that for the first 51 weeks of 2010, carloads are up more than 7 percent and intermodal is up more than 14 percent over the first 51 weeks of 2009.

Norfolk Southern has won final funding from the U.S. Department of Transportation for its long planned 2,500-mile Crescent Corridor linking New Orleans, Memphis and the Northeast, reports the Journal of Commerce.

The Crescent Corridor improvements, when completed, will increase height clearances and speed double-stack movements along the route, and expand intermodal terminals where trailers and containers are loaded onto and unloaded off of trains.

The most recent $105 million federal grant will be used to help develop a 261-acre intermodal terminal near Birmingham, Ala., and a 380-acre intermodal terminal near Memphis, reports the Journal of Commerce.

“By diverting 1.3 million commercial trucks from Interstates, the Crescent Corridor will greatly improve air quality along the route, reduce traffic congestion and generate significant fuel savings,” said the DOT in finalizing the grant.

What better gift to your health and your family’s health could there be than to resolve to stop smoking in 2011?

Easier said than done. That’s for sure.

But help is available. For UTU rail members covered by the national contract health plans, each of the medical benefits have smoking cessation programs included in their wellness programs.

Additionally, there is a specific benefit associated with the prescription drug program for smoking cessation aids.

UTU members covered by other health plans should check with their health care plan administrators or directly with their health plans.

For those covered under Railroad Medicare, counseling is included as benefit with no cost to the insured. Check with your Medicare provider for more details.

Or, www.Medicare.gov  and click on the smoking cessation page.

Or, www.palmettogba.com/medicare and scroll to the section, “People with Railroad Medicare.”

While smoking rates have fallen over the past 30 years, those rates have not declined since 2005.

Look at the numbers and decide for yourself if you should seek help to stop smoking. Better yet, share the numbers with your family members and ask them.

  • Smokers cause 88 million non-smokers, including children, to be exposed to second-hand smoke.
  • Annually, more than 440,000 Americans die from the effects of smoking, accounting for one of every five deaths in the United States.
  • More deaths are caused each year by tobacco use than from illegal drug use, alcohol use, motor vehicle injuries, murders and AIDS, combined.
  • Smoking causes 80 percent of all lung cancer deaths in women, and 90 percent in men.

SHAWNEE, Kan. — Robert G. Martin, a former UTU general chairperson (GO 457) on Kansas City Southern Railway, died here Dec. 24 at age 80.

A native of Beaumont, Texas, he was a member of UTU predecessor Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, and, later, UTU Local 20 in Beaumont. Martin worked as a yardman for KCS in Beaumont from the 1950s until 1980, when he moved to Kansas City, Mo., following his election as a general chairperson. He retired in 1999.

Martin is survived by his wife of 44 years, Cara, as well as two sons, a stepson, a stepdaughter, four grandchildren, a brother and a sister.

No services are planned. Condolences and messages may be posted at www.amosfamily.com; or mailed to: The Amos Family, 10901 Johnson Dr., Shawnee, KS 66203-2829.

By James Stem, UTU National Legislative Director

The Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (RSIA) was not all that rail labor wanted in a safety bill, but it was a good start, and contains much of what we have long sought. Work still needs to be done, including an end to limbo time, advance notice of start times, and an end to arbitrary discipline tied to unreasonable availability policies.

We said after passage of the bill that we would work with our friends in Congress to refine and improve the bill.

The process has begun.

In his final days in Congress, Transportation & Infrastructure Committee Chairman Jim Oberstar (D-Minn.) introduced H.R. 6519, the Railroad Hours of Service Act.

Rail labor and Mr. Oberstar, one of the best friends rail labor has ever had in Congress, knew there was not time in the lame-duck session of Congress for the bill — which includes improvements to hours-of-service provisions of the RSIA — to pass.

Thus, H.R. 6519 was intended as a place-setter — a bill whose provisions already are winning support among UTU lawmaker friends and which will be re-introduced by other friends of the UTU in the new Congress in 2011.

The UTU, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, and the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen will be working closely on a new bill with our congressional friends of labor come January and the start of the new Congress.

Provisions of the bill include:

  • An affirmative statement that railroad workers subject to hours-of-service “shall be provided predictable and defined work and rest periods.”
  • A required 10 hours of undisturbed rest be taken immediately prior to going on duty rather than immediately after going off duty. This provision is intended to end the common practice of so-called “paper deadheads” and “dropped turns” with a 10-hour call.
  • All yardmaster — as well as co-mingled service as yardmasters and dispatchers — are to be subject to hours-of-service regulations.
  • Deadheads in excess of a time period shall count will count as job starts.
  • All interim release periods are to require prior notification before going off duty.
  • Limbo time will be restricted to two hours per each tour of duty.

Although some provisions we also want were not included in H.R. 6519, we will be working to have them included in the new bill this next session of Congress.

They include:

  • A provision to cover regular yard assignments with defined start times under provisions that now apply to passenger and commuter rail assignments.
  • A provision that no amount of time at an away-from-home terminal will reset the calendar day clock.
  • A provision requiring that hot, nutritious food be available 24 hours per day at the sleeping quarters.

The UTU also will support additional provisions specific to railroad signalmen as sought by their organization.

The new Congress will include 100 new members, and many were elected with the support of rail labor organizations. We have already begun discussions with those new members and are continuing discussions with our other friends in Congress toward early introduction of the Oberstar place-setter, with the additional provisions included.

We know many UTU-represented bus drivers who would cherish for their systems the same zero-tolerance policy toward disorderly conduct that is in effect in Milwaukee.

A bus passenger there was escorted off the bus and fined $500 for using obscenities in front of other passengers.

Although the passenger, who was collared by an undercover police officer, told WISN television news that he considered it “un-American” to be slapped with the disorderly conduct fine, a spokesperson for the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Department said there is a zero-tolerance approach to disorderly conduct on county buses.

Some $1.1 billion in federal grants for high-speed rail between Chicago and St. Louis are about to flow to the State of Illinois after the Illinois DOT, Amtrak and Union Pacific reached an agreement on how to accommodate freight and passenger trains on the affected track, reports the Springfield State Journal-Register.

The Illinois DOT predicts that when the high-speed rail line is completed in 2014, the passenger train trip between Chicago and St. Louis will be 4 hours, 10 minutes — about a 30 percent reduction in the current passenger-train time and faster than an automobile traveling non-stop at the legal speed limit. Passenger-train speeds are projected to be 110 mph.

Two tentative four-year agreements have been reached between the UTU and Florida East Coast Railway (FEC).

One of the tentative four-year agreements covers FEC conductors, engineers, trainmen and yardmen represented by the UTU.

The second tentative four-year pact covers FEC yardmasters represented by the UTU.

The tentative agreements, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2009, and extending through Dec. 31, 2012, cover wages, benefits and working conditions. The tentative agreements must be ratified by the crafts, and include retroactive pay.

Town hall meetings, to explain the tentative agreements prior to a ratification vote, will be conducted across the property during January.

UTU negotiators included General Chairperson John Hancock and Vice General Chairperson John Whitaker (both, GO 851), Local 903 Chairperson Jim Bush, and Local 1138 Chairperson Jim McCorkle. The UTU negotiating team was assisted by UTU International Vice President Robert Kerley.

FEC is a Class II railroad, operating more than 350 miles of mainline track along Florida’s east coast. In November, FEC completed 2,000 consecutive days of on-time service to UPS — a record for any transportation company serving the logistics giant. During that almost 5 1/2 year period, FEC delivered 125,000 on-time intermodal loads for UPS, consisting of more than 200 million packages.