Rail News

Two activist rail shipper groups say they see new signs that the Senate could move on long-dormant rail competition legislation in the final months of the current Congress.

From a helicopter over CenterPoint Properties’ 6,000-acre integrated intermodal rail logistics hub at Joliet, Ill., about 40 miles southwest of Chicago, the structure that stands out above all o

New rail regulatory legislation appears dead for this Congress, according to the top executive for Norfolk Southern Railway.

Kansas City Southern carried 700 U.S.-bound containers from Mexico’s Port of Lazaro Cardenas during August and expects volume on the route to continue to grow, a KCS executive said.

A freight railroad official with strong ties to shipping out of Mexico says he is seeing some offshore manufacturing shift back to North America as labor costs rise in China.

North American railcar owners took 10,759 parked freight cars out of storage during August, leaving 348,712 or 22.7 percent of the total continental fleet idled as of Sept. 1.

Canadian Pacific Railway expanded its ability to carry intermodal cars on trains 45 percent over the past two years, a company official says, and expects more gains as part of a plan to add capacity b

North America’s largest railroads saw their bulk commodity carloads hit a second consecutive 2010 peak in the week ending Sept.

After three years of enlarging Appalachian Mountain tunnels, Norfolk Southern Railway opened its Heartland Corridor to double-stack operations Thursday between Virginia's seaport area and big Midwest

U.S. railroads hauled more bulk railcar loads and intermodal containers or trailers in August than any time since the autumn of 2008, said the Association of American Railroads.

Railcar manufacturer FreightCar America signed a definitive agreement to buy the business assets of DTE Rail Services, a railcar repair and management firm, from parent DTE Energy for about $23.2 mill

President Obama said he wants long-term transportation legislation to include a permanent infrastructure bank that can make investments outside regular state formulas, and to put his passenger rail pr

Industry groups were scrambling for details on how the administration expects to develop the $50 bil

President Obama proposed to spend $50 billion to "jumpstart" construction of roads, railways and airport runways, the White House said, and pair it with "a long-term framework to reform

The Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority edged one step closer to securing what could be the largest loan ever from a little-used Federal Railroad Administration finance program.

Owners of North America’s rail equipment fleets are betting the thriving intermodal market will maintain its growth pace, placing orders for new equipment with hard-hit railcar manufacturers.

Norfolk Southern Railway has been literally changing the landscape of freight rail transportation in the eastern United States for three years, carving out new clearances through the Appalachian Mount

German railroad company Deutsche Bahn said it will spend $525 million on new rail cars, locomotives and cargo facilities across Europe in 2010 to keep pace with rising freight traffic.

A wide-ranging increase in railcar loadings lifted volume in the bulk commodities and equipment categories of rail traffic to their highest levels this year.

Kansas City Southern, the smallest of the North American Class I carriers, predicts second-half 2010 revenue growth of nearly 20 percent and says its rail lines have "fully recovered" from the impact

Major North American railroads racked up big intermodal numbers for the third straight week in the week ending Aug. 28 and set a new 2010 high in train loadings of containers and trailers.

North America's small railroads saw freight traffic for the week ending Aug. 28 rise to the highest level since late April, continuing a volume rebound that began in July.

Gulf & Ohio Railways, Inc. (G&O), headquartered in Knoxville, Tenn., intends to acquire South Carolina’s Lancaster & Chester Railway Co. (L&C), the two have announced.

The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) on Aug.

Norfolk Southern Railway says it will cut greenhouse gas emissions in its operations 10 percent by 2014 from 2009 levels through fuel-saving technology and efficiency improvements.

The Congressional Budget Office is drawing the attention of transportation policy experts with an upbeat estimate that the nation’s Highway Trust Fund should be able to cover its projected spending ne

France's state-owned railway SNCF returned to profit in the first half of 2010, helped by a recovery in freight traffic and logistics.

Rail equipment suppliers L.B. Foster and Portec Rail Products said they agreed to extend to Dec.

Major North American railroads increased their loadings in recent weeks of key raw materials as well as some finished goods related to manufacturing activity.

Major U.S. railroads set a new 2010 peak for intermodal shipments in the week ending Aug. 21, the second straight week of new highs in container and trailer loadings.

North American short line and regional railroads are reporting freight traffic gains on the rise since mid-summer, a contrast to the wave of weak economic reports on housing and other activity for Jul

Railcar and barge builder Greenbrier Companies took orders valued at $130 million to build new railcars and modify older ones, mostly to meet still-growing demand for high capacity domestic intermodal

Orders for big-ticket manufactured goods rose 0.3 percent in July but only because of a 76 percent jump in sales of commercial aircraft, the Commerce Department said.

The Federal Railroad Administration plans to issue revamped guidance to freight railroads in the next month or so to address rail executives' concerns over requirements they could face when accepting

The Port of North Dakota on Monday shipped its first container load of agricultural commodities to international markets.

The Department of Transportation is starting to push out the first of nearly $17.6 million in a multi-layered stimulus grant for upgrades of some Appalachian freight short line railroads, by nailing d

Rail industry products supplier Wabtec completed its planned acquisition of electronic instrument maker Bach-Simpson from Global Railway Industries for about $13 million.

Railroads and shipper activists are trying to make sure their issues are on the table when lawmakers return to Capitol Hill after their August break, especially because the legislators have a lot on t

Just when North American intermodal cargo handlers were getting used to the idea that domestic rail-truck combination moves might catch up to ship-to-train international business, this year’s se

One year after he became chairman of the Surface Transportation Board that regulates economic issues between railroads and shippers, Daniel R.