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You may be onto something. >The Surface Transportation Board already knows this; the FRA knows this, the shippers know this; the car owners/lessees know this,

You may be onto something. >The Surface Transportation Board already knows this; the FRA knows this, the shippers know this; the car owners/lessees know this, the executives know this; and certainly the front line knows all too well If all these people know about it, why haven't we heard of this before?

dragontamer 5y ago
I presume we all here work at some kind of tech firm? Do you think railroad engineers / conductors would know about a crappy API being pushed by Microsoft or Apple that would affect application development over the next 5 years? Its not like we computer-engineers/software-engineers air out our dirty laundry each day to the public.
- ethbr0 5y ago
  Or how many of us know about a terribly unreliable internal database that backs a product critical to core business functionality?
  - bombcar 5y ago
    One difference is that when the HN crowd screws something up, twitter goes down for a few minutes, GitHub is offline for hours, not much to really complain about. A PSR leaves the rails and people can very easily die, and at some point there will be a major event.
pooper 5y ago
> If all these people know about it, why haven't we heard of this before? While I submit that the article has probably no value on its own, I don't think your argument makes sense either. I think it is expected that people in position of power don't publicly speak about everything. I mean on one end of the spectrum nobody talked about dragnet until someone did. On the other end, "no one" talked about the problems with Boeing 737 max problem until planes started falling off the sky in the sense that we didn't pay attention. I think why haven't we heard of this before is not an argument.
Supermancho 5y ago
I've heard it shrug. My brother tried working for the railroads. He quit within a month. It's lonely, it's dangerous, and you don't want to know how reckless the trains are being run in the US (around the midwest). There are train overpasses in my area which are cracked and falling apart (I can send you pictures). The number of derailings, the amount of hazardous material (chlorine is a blip), and the skill drain has brought the rail industry to a crisis point. We're just waiting for its Hindenburg moment.
phil21 5y ago
I follow industry news and talk to folks employed by Class I's, and this is not recent news. I would generally agree with the statement - if your job is to be aware of railroad industry issues, this will be at the top of your list or you'd simply be incompetent. This article is strange in that it's focusing on a single issue of "PSR", but in general terms anyone casually following the industry even as a fan would be well aware of the labor vs. management conflict that has been brewing and escalating for decades. You can only squeeze so much efficiency out of systems before they break.
sophacles 5y ago
I bet there are tons of things in every industry that are "widely" known that you've never heard. I bet this is true of your industry. Why would I make that bet? Because it's extremely unlikely that you know everything, and I will take that bet for any person in any industry about any industry. I'm certain your ignorance is a sign of something suspicious - just not about this topic.
dogleash 5y ago
>If all these people know about it, why haven't we heard of this before? Information hardly ever travels as fast as information can travel. We've had arguments on HN about whether or not open secrets in tech are true. Some posters assembling a laundry list of reasons the assertion seemed unlikely or implausible. And other posters with first and second hand stories of it happening. Why the fuck would we know anything about trains?

dragontamer 5y ago

I presume we all here work at some kind of tech firm? Do you think railroad engineers / conductors would know about a crappy API being pushed by Microsoft or Apple that would affect application development over the next 5 years? Its not like we computer-engineers/software-engineers air out our dirty laundry each day to the public.

ethbr0 5y ago
Or how many of us know about a terribly unreliable internal database that backs a product critical to core business functionality?
- bombcar 5y ago
  One difference is that when the HN crowd screws something up, twitter goes down for a few minutes, GitHub is offline for hours, not much to really complain about. A PSR leaves the rails and people can very easily die, and at some point there will be a major event.

pooper 5y ago

> If all these people know about it, why haven't we heard of this before? While I submit that the article has probably no value on its own, I don't think your argument makes sense either. I think it is expected that people in position of power don't publicly speak about everything. I mean on one end of the spectrum nobody talked about dragnet until someone did. On the other end, "no one" talked about the problems with Boeing 737 max problem until planes started falling off the sky in the sense that we didn't pay attention. I think why haven't we heard of this before is not an argument.

Supermancho 5y ago

I've heard it shrug. My brother tried working for the railroads. He quit within a month. It's lonely, it's dangerous, and you don't want to know how reckless the trains are being run in the US (around the midwest). There are train overpasses in my area which are cracked and falling apart (I can send you pictures). The number of derailings, the amount of hazardous material (chlorine is a blip), and the skill drain has brought the rail industry to a crisis point. We're just waiting for its Hindenburg moment.

phil21 5y ago

I follow industry news and talk to folks employed by Class I's, and this is not recent news. I would generally agree with the statement - if your job is to be aware of railroad industry issues, this will be at the top of your list or you'd simply be incompetent. This article is strange in that it's focusing on a single issue of "PSR", but in general terms anyone casually following the industry even as a fan would be well aware of the labor vs. management conflict that has been brewing and escalating for decades. You can only squeeze so much efficiency out of systems before they break.

sophacles 5y ago

I bet there are tons of things in every industry that are "widely" known that you've never heard. I bet this is true of your industry. Why would I make that bet? Because it's extremely unlikely that you know everything, and I will take that bet for any person in any industry about any industry. I'm certain your ignorance is a sign of something suspicious - just not about this topic.

dogleash 5y ago

>If all these people know about it, why haven't we heard of this before? Information hardly ever travels as fast as information can travel. We've had arguments on HN about whether or not open secrets in tech are true. Some posters assembling a laundry list of reasons the assertion seemed unlikely or implausible. And other posters with first and second hand stories of it happening. Why the fuck would we know anything about trains?