UNION PACIFIC MOVES TO GET BACK ON TRACK.Byline: Barbara Keenan Associated Press Associated Press: see news agency. Associated Press (AP) Cooperative news agency, the oldest and largest in the U.S. and long the largest in the world. Abandoning a plan to use a ship to move freight from Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. to the East Coast, Union Pacific Railroad Union Pacific Railroad, transportation company chartered (1862) by Congress to build part of the nation's first transcontinental railroad line. Under terms of the Pacific Railroads Act, the Union Pacific was authorized to build a line westward from Omaha, Nebr. said Wednesday it would release business to other railroads and take other steps to unclog its congested con·gest·ed adj. Affected with or characterized by congestion. congested ENT adjective Referring to a boggy blood-filled tissue. See Nasal congestion. rail lines. The railroad filed a plan Wednesday with the Surface Transportation Board spelling out measures to move as many as 40,000 cars off the railroad. ``Really what we're talking about here is the railroad equivalent of a traffic jam,'' said Union Pacific Railroad spokesman John Bromley. The Omaha-based railroad plans to divert traffic to other railroads' tracks temporarily. It will also transfer trains to lightly used lines, reroute trains around congested terminals, suspend some coal trains and reduce the number of locomotives on some trains. Bromley said the most congested areas are in Texas and Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, . Service in the central corridor, roughly stretching from Chicago to Oakland, should return to acceptable levels within 30 days, Union Pacific said. Service in the southern corridor - from Memphis and New Orleans New Orleans (ôr`lēənz –lənz, ôrlēnz`), city (2006 pop. 187,525), coextensive with Orleans parish, SE La., between the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain, 107 mi (172 km) by water from the river mouth; founded through Texas and into Southern California - should be back to normal within 90 days. ``Everyone at our company is working hard on restoring service to levels that will satisfy our customers,'' said Union Pacific Corp. Chairman Dick Davidson. ``We feel strongly that the major actions outlined in our recovery plan will allow this to happen.'' The company said the service recovery effort is expected to hurt Union Pacific Corp.'s financial performance for the rest of the year and possibly for the first quarter of 1998. Faced with mounting complaints about service from shippers on the West Coast and Texas, Union Pacific looked earlier this week at an unconventional way to ease congestion The condition of a network when there is not enough bandwidth to support the current traffic load. congestion - When the offered load of a data communication path exceeds the capacity. in the Los Angeles area - leasing a ship to move goods through the Panama Canal to Georgia. The railroad abandoned the plan Tuesday, saying shippers hoped Union Pacific would be able to transport their goods more quickly than the expected 12-day journey by sea. Still, with about 3,000 truck-sized containers backed up and holding consumer items like television sets, tennis shoes and appliances, Union Pacific could not guarantee quick delivery by rail. Union Pacific Railroad is experiencing growing pains grow·ing pains pl.n. Pains in the limbs and joints of children or adolescents, frequently occurring at night and often attributed to rapid growth but arising from various unrelated causes. in its year-old merger with Southern Pacific, which created the country's biggest railroad with 35,000 miles of track spreading west out of Chicago. |
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