Railroad News

Union Pacific Railroad last week published its latest Building America Report, which includes an expanded approach to the Class I’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategy.

The report identifies the company’s ESG priorities and explains the company’s ongoing community support, supplier diversity and philanthropic initiatives.

Union Pacific Railroad recently shipped the military vehicle that pulled down the statue of Saddam Hussein during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, according to an article posted on the Class I's Inside Track website.

UP subsidiary Loup Logistics provided a first and final mile transportation solution for the 140,000-pound M88A2 Hercules.

Each member of the supply chain must focus on optimizing their part of it and keep communicating with other players both upstream and downstream to address challenges, according to Union Pacific Railroad's Inside Track newsletter.

Changes in consumer spending habits during the pandemic, labor shortages in the trucking and warehousing industries, and final-mile delivery delays are contributing to industry-wide supply-chain shortages in the United States, wrote Elise Gosch, UP's assistant vice president of marketing and sales-premium intermodal.

Union Pacific Railroad Assistant Vice President-External Relations Wes Lujan recently posted a column on the freight-rail industry’s relationship with Amtrak.

The column’s timing is related to Amtrak’s 15-year, $75 billion plan to expand intercity passenger-rail service across the country. The plan will depend on Congress passing federal funding to help pay for it, as well as negotiations with the nation’s freight railroads on whose tracks Amtrak trains would travel.

A Union Pacific Railroad firefighting crew with water tank cars from the Class I's fleet helped fight a lava fire in Northern California in late June, according to an article on UP's website.

UP operates a fleet of about 50 water tank cars known as the fire-car fleet. The former tank cars were converted into water pump cars and can hold 7,000 to 23,000 gallons of water. They feature nozzles that can spray water more than 75 feet.

Union Pacific Railroad's Heartland Service Unit has reduced its personal reportable injuries by 25% and human factor-derailments by 58% so far in 2021.

One of the unit's initiatives, called "Walk-with-Me Wednesdays," engages directly with train crews, UP officials said in an item posted on the Class I's InsideTrack web page. Each Wednesday, supervisors walk around the yard with two employees and show them how safe and reliable service impacts customers.

Union Pacific Railroad's "We Are ONE" Employee Resource Group (ERG) commemorative locomotive is ready to hit the tracks. UP No. 1979 is named after the year in which the Class I established its first ERG, the Black Employee Network (BEN).

The locomotive will travel through UP's system on its way to the ONE ERG conference to be held in Omaha Sept. 1-2. Its unveiling will be held in Houston in honor of Juneteenth day, the holiday marking the end of slavery in the United States.

Union Pacific Railroad yesterday published its 2020 Building America Report, the railroad's annual report on its environmental, social and governance (ESG) initiatives.

The report unveils UP's new cumulative ESG strategy called "Building a Sustainable Future 2030," which includes four areas of concentration: investing in the UP workforce, driving sustainable solutions, championing environmental stewardship and strengthening the communities UP serves.