Opinion ID: 393013
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Deliberate Downgrading

Text: 41 Those protesting the Rushville branch abandonment assert that N&W's deferral of maintenance represented an improper, deliberate attempt to downgrade the branches in order to perfect a case for abandonment. The ICC concluded that since the line was not, according to the ICC's computations, a profitable operation, N&W properly deferred maintenance in recent years. The ICC found no evidence of specific intent to deliberately downgrade the line. 42 Since the ICC on remand may alter its conclusions about the profitability of the branches and that change could affect its view of the justifications for N& W's deferring maintenance we cannot address with certainty the propriety of the ICC's conclusions. In order to provide some guidance to the ICC, however, we consider it necessary to discuss the ICC's findings as they now stand. 43 We can find no error in the ICC's conclusion on N&W's intent in deferring maintenance, based as it was upon a finding that the Rushville branch was an unprofitable operation. Both sides in this case cite Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad Company Abandonment, 338 I.C.C. 728 (1971) in support of their positions. 10 There the ICC set out criteria rail companies should address to demonstrate that a genuine need to economize prompted deferral of maintenance. The petitioners claim that the ICC did not consider these factors when it overturned the administrative law judge's conclusion that N&W exhibited an intent to defer maintenance to perfect its case for abandonment. As evidence of this failure to consider the criteria, the petitioners point particularly to the absence of any mention in the ICC's opinion of the incident in which N&W, prior to filing its abandonment application, told the Rush Grain Company that the railroad anticipated abandoning the branch. This discouraged the Rush Grain Company from building a spur track which would add traffic to the Rushville branch. 44 The ICC properly stated that once it had made its determination that deferring maintenance was financially justified, the governing standard required it to accept N&W's decision to defer maintenance for economic reasons unless the evidence showed some ulterior motive to downgrade deliberately. The ICC was not required to discuss each factual point brought out by the petitioners, especially since the administrative law judge's contrary finding primarily rested on a conclusion about economic viability, albeit different from that of the ICC. For the administrative law judge, the Rush Grain incident took on significance only because N&W had no financial incentive to abandon the Rushville branch. N&W, in his view, should have been actively encouraging new business on the branch. But N&W's informing a prospective shipper of an action expected to be made by the line takes on a different cast when the branch is thought to be highly unprofitable. While it is true that the ICC is obliged adequately to address the evidence presented by one protesting an abandonment, see Harborlite Corporation v. ICC, 613 F.2d 1088 (D.C.Cir.1979), the requirement cannot be carried beyond any reasonable necessity. Once the reason prompting the administrative law judge to consider the evidence dropped from the case upon a finding of unprofitability, the ICC was under no obligation to discuss the evidence further.