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BNSF moving onto remote control technology
(The following story by Vikas Bajas appeared on The Dallas Morning News website on October 9.)
FORT WORTH, Texas -- For an old economy company, Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. is a poster child for brave new world automation.
The railroad drills its engineers on 40 simulators outfitted with all the controls found in a locomotive. Rail yard employees use remote controls to move and switch cars, creating trains bound for different destinations. Not to be left behind, conductors file reports on arrivals, departures, pickups and drop-offs using a voice-recognition system.
For the last few years, Burlington Northern has been putting $80 million a year into information technology, with as much as $40 million going to software development. Partly as a result of that, its shipments per employee grew 6 percent annually in the last two years. Revenue per worker has grown an average of 4.3 percent in the last three years.
By comparison, the economy averaged a 3.55 percent productivity growth rate over the last four years.
And executives say they aren't finished yet.
"There are multiple things moving in many areas, all of which have safety implications as well as productivity implications," said Gregory W. Stengem, vice president for safety, training and operations support.
But not everyone cherishes Fort Worth-based BNSF's intense focus on productivity. Labor union leaders and workers say some technologies are making work more inefficient and dangerous by reducing staffing levels.
Smaller workforce
BNSF's workforce has shrunk from 38,700 in 2000 to 35,900 in 2003, though officials expect it to climb to 36,535 by the end of this year as it adds engineers and conductors to keep up with business growth. The job reductions have come from retirements, attrition and layoffs.
Executives say technology is not only making the railroad more productive and profitable, but also reducing errors, accidents and injuries.
A veteran of the railroad business, Mr. Stengem frequently evokes the landmark transition from steam to diesel engines in the 1940s and 1950s to describe Burlington's current technology transformation.
"Even then there were people saying diesel was going to be the ruination of the railroad," he said.
Labor leaders' biggest complaint has been about the use of remote controls to switch rail cars. The technology, which BNSF started using in 2002, allows two switchmen on the ground to move a locomotive without the help of an onboard engineer.
Switchmen redistribute cars from one train to several other trains based on each shipment's final destination. One worker switches tracks while the other unhitches rail cars and moves the train back and forth, with the remote control, to send the cars rolling onto other tracks.
The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen contends that its members are better trained to understand and operate them and should move the train.
"This is all about crew costs," said Don Hahs, national president for the Brotherhood. "It allows them to reduce a member from the operating crew. ... This is not about safety."
A switchman at BNSF's Haslet rail yard said he prefers having an engineer because the trains he and his partner move get so long they have a hard time seeing the engine they are supposed to control.
"I am always worried," said Brad Long, who has worked at BNSF for three years. "I don't want to hit anything. You just have to think ahead with the remote. When you tell ... [the train] to stop, it takes a few seconds."
Mr. Stengem pointed to a Federal Railway Administration study showing that remote controls have reduced injuries by 57 percent. Crews worried about moving longer trains can send one person to the front of the train to make sure nothing is in the way.
Some workers support the technology. The United Transportation Union, which represents switchmen, broke with the engineers and accepted it in 2002.
"Change is hard to accept for all of us," Mr. Stengem said. "What I can assure you of is we really believe ... that the level of risk in switching operations has been reduced."
Burlington is also aiming its technology at paperwork.
More technology
Working with Dallas-based Intervoice Inc., the maker of speech software, BNSF is asking some conductors to call their reports directly into the corporate network via cellphone or radio. The system is similar to technology that banks and airlines use.
"Their goal is obviously to improve data" collection, said Ron Owens, an Intervoice director of professional services.
Conductors who are handling more complicated shipments enter information on touch-screen computers that can be connected to the network via docking stations. Both technologies replace faxed reports that were later typed by clerks into BNSF's systems.
Reports filed on terminals are 99.9 percent accurate, while reports that have to go through three individuals are accurate 77 percent of the time, said Mike Acosta, a senior technology manager at Burlington.
"This has brought them out of the era of paper and pencil."
Monday, October 11, 2004
© 1997-2009 Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen
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