# Letters from an old railway official (second series)/Letter 20

LETTER XX.
THE FALLACY OF THE TRAIN-MILE UNIT.
Tucson, Ariz., August 19, 1911.
My Dear Boy:—Do you think it logical and just to pay a train (including engine) crew the same wages for going over the freight district with a light caboose as with 50 or 75 cars? Be careful how you answer.
As I understand it, the train-mile was adopted as a unit of compensation for employes on the theory that piece work rewards the deserving and promotes efficiency. Whatever the merits or demerits of the piece work theory, I have never been able to reconcile its applicability to train service. A man operating a machine in a shop can stop or start his individual machine, can save steam power or electric current without seriously inconveniencing his fellow workers or the general operation of the plant. A railroad train cannot move regardless of all other trains on the road. Such independence of function will cause either a criminal collision or an expensive blockade. A ​train must, therefore, move according to a time-table and orders. The space occupied by a train, unlike a stationary machine, is so variable that time becomes the essence of the proposition. The train crew cannot be allowed that freedom of action which permits of piece work. Too many arbitrary conditions are necessarily imposed to warrant a very extended application of a practical bonus system. One delayed train will upset the whole day’s combination. On the other hand, the task imposed upon a train crew is extremely definite and easy to measure, when the equation can be solved for all the variables.
So fallacious a unit of compensation as the train-mile breeds numerous illogical practices. We penalize ourselves every time we run a train without full tonnage. Conditions of traffic may demand quick movement regardless of tonnage. When business is heavy terminals are congested and empty equipment is scarce. We all know that the way to relieve congested terminals is to run light, fast trains. This serves a double purpose, relieving the terminals and increasing the earning power of the equipment. Unfortunately our fundamental conception is so distorted that we mulct ourselves ​in money by doing that which is an obvious necessity. Why not so arrange our methods that we can be rewarded for quick judgment and prompt action?
A shop workman sups, sleeps and breakfasts at his own home. A train crew must have increased expenses when away from the home terminal. A train crew would really be ahead of the game as far as expenses are concerned if a round trip could be made within the sixteen-hour limit and the away-from-home terminal expenses avoided. We say that demurrage is imposed primarily to hasten the release of equipment. We claim that normally we would rather have the cars than the dollars of demurrage. If cars are so valuable, how much should we charge ourselves for the hire of the fifty cars which are twelve or fifteen hours getting over the district?
We can work out by a mathematical formula the most economical scheme for fuel consumption and maximum tractive effort. It is more difficult to devise a formula to express the effect of drastic laws caused by poor service. Attempting to club converging live stock runs in big trains has caused, in some states, legislation covering the movement of stock. Perhaps ​this is offset by the claims save for missing the market with delayed stock. Is it not a sad commentary to think that legislation is necessary to make us do what is for our own best interests?
There can be no doubt that for a heavy and regular movement of low grade commodities on two or four track roads the big train is logical and economical. Most of the prairie roads are single track. Most of the distances between the prairie cities are relatively long. Stock, perishable freight and merchandise must have rapid movement. Is it wise under such a disparity of conditions to make the train-mile rigid and sacred? Why not pay men by the hour, with a monthly guarantee, and run trains sometimes light and sometimes heavy, sometimes fast and sometimes slow, to meet actual controlling conditions of traffic? When business happened to be light, equipment plentiful, and terminals open we would penalize ourselves in wages for slower movement, but would save in fuel, in engine house expense, etc. Just where the economical limit would be, just how it would all work out, I do not pretend to say. I do say, however, that the old methods can be improved when we start ​from proper basic conceptions. I do not believe that we yet understand the relation between increased cost of maintenance of equipment and decreased wages for train crews.
Perhaps because I had the honor of braking on a way freight I have never outgrown the idea of the practical trainman that a local freight is a traveling switch engine and a peddler of L. C. L. merchandise. Whatever may be the showing as to percentage of tractive power utilized I am unable to see the wisdom of a way freight dragging in and out of passing tracks all day with a lot of through cars. The claim is often made that a few big trains can be easily handled by the dispatcher, because the number of meeting points is decreased. My own opinion is that this seeming advantage is often more than offset by the unwieldiness of the big train. Fear of censure for delaying some important train makes the conductor “leery” about starting and the dispatcher timid about directing a prompt movement. When we begin wrong, how not-to-do-it methods always follow. The chief dispatcher will let freight be delayed in a yard for a full train with power needed at ​the other end, if he can start a light caboose without its being included in the average train load showing. How much better, and how much easier, to run two fractional trains in the direction of unbalanced traffic than one light caboose and another dreary drag! The shipper, only a hard-headed business man, takes the same view. He becomes skeptical of all our statements, before commissions or elsewhere, because of our frequent seeming lack of judgment.
Let us not spend too much time in discussion as to theoretical possibilities. My assertions can be either proved or disproved by actual demonstration. In the next labor agreements you make include a stipulation for experiment on some division. My prediction is that if you can convince the labor leaders of your fairness they will give the scheme a trial for the sake of more possible time at home. With a full trial the results will speak for themselves. Success in such matters is made possible only by enlisting the most intelligent efforts of all concerned. Let your officials and employes understand that you do not claim to know it all, that you believe in their practical intelligence as well as in your own, that ideas ​are greater than men, and that right wrongs no man.
Railroads have grown so fast that our conceptions of working units have sometimes out-stripped practical possibilities in performance. Too frequently we make the unit too large. There must be a practical limit beyond which the train becomes too long for an economical unit of movement. The fact that we should have elasticity rather than rigidity in the size of our economical train emphasizes the necessity for defining the elastic limit. Practical experience and sound judgment must aid in interpreting and applying not only the laws of matter and physical nature, but the laws of sociology and human nature as well. After the lading for the trip is discharged, the car cannot be sold or abandoned, as was the flat boat which Abraham Lincoln helped to float down the Mississippi river to New Orleans. Have you not seen cars pulled to pieces in big trains, have you not seen freight delayed in a manner to suggest to an innocent bystander that the road was perhaps running its last train and giving its cars their last load?
The inevitable tendency of the big train is to hold back and combine in large lots cars ​destined to the same point and to the same consignee. When a whole train can be unloaded at the ship’s side at tidewater, or at a large consuming plant, the system is ideal. The trouble begins with the small consignee. Instead of giving him a regular, systematic delivery of the five or ten cars which he can unload each day, our tendency is to bring in twenty-five or fifty cars every five days or so, and then express our horrified astonishment at his failure to release promptly. No, we should not run special trains of five or ten cars for each consignee. What we should do is to watch the matter so carefully that we can feel certain we are considering all the factors of expense as well as that of seeming light tonnage. It may, under given conditions, be cheaper to run light trains than to put on expensive switch engines, to relieve unnecessary congestion in receiving terminals, than to increase overtime and demoralize the road by pulling out drawbars when sawing by at short passing tracks. Sometimes money can be saved by balancing motive power as between steep and level territory.
As a good soldier and a faithful hired hand you must build up for yourself and your ​superiors the best possible record for train load. Carry out the policy consistently and loyally. At the same time study the subject. Do not have to flag in, but be prepared to run as a section of a better unit of comparison when the train mile loses its first class running rights.
Speaking of running in sections, you have doubtess thought how inconsistent and almost criminally dangerous is the method of displaying signals. We drill our men to watch the rear of the train for the presence of something, the markers, a positive indication. When the markers are seen, the train is complete and the opposing train can proceed in safety. If the train happens to be complete without displaying markers, or the markers are overlooked, the opposing train declines to proceed. An avoidable delay occurs, but the error is on the side of safety and away from a collision. At the head end, however, we tell our men to watch for the absence of something, the classification signals, a negative condition. When classification signals are not seen the train schedule is complete and the opposing train proceeds in fancied safety. If the train happens to be incomplete without displaying signals or the signals are overlooked, the opposing train ​proceeds just the same. No delay occurs, but probably a collision, for the error is on the side of danger and toward a collision. The practice should be reversed. The last or only section should display classification signals. A positive indication should replace a negative. Can the train rules committee of the ladylike American Railway Association beat the Interstate Commerce Commission to this unprotected draw? Cases of such avoidable collisions can be cited, even though “we never had one on our road.”
Some roads prefer special schedules and extra trains to movement in sections. On the good old Big Four we handled everything possible in sections. I think this latter method the better. Theoretically yardmen, section men, tower men and all others should be always prepared for extra trains. Practically, the more information that can be disseminated among intelligent men the more effectively can they coöperate in preventing disaster or delay. There are fewer unlocked switches and fewer unspiked rails when information is not locked in the dispatcher’s office and not spiked down by too many train orders.
Affectionately, your own,
D. A. D.