Railroad News

Industry organizations that represent major customers of Norfolk Southern Corp. have asked the Surface Transportation Board to reject Canadian Pacific's hostile takeover bid, according to the Reuters news agency.

Reuters reviewed copies of the letters, which have not been made public. Sent last month, the letters revealed customers' concerns over CP's cost-cutting plans, the impact on service and the potential for higher prices for customers, the news agency reported.

[Editor's note: This story has been updated to include CP's response, which was issued this afternoon.]

Norfolk Southern Corp.'s board has unanimously rejected Canadian Pacific's latest merger proposal, NS officials announced today.

The Andersons Inc. announced yesterday that it will begin an expansion of its ethanol facility in Albion, Mich.

The expansion project will double the facility's capacity, Anderson officials said in a press release. The facility is served by Norfolk Southern Railway.

Norfolk Southern Corp.'s board will consult with its financial, legal and regulatory advisers to "carefully consider" Canadian Pacific's latest takeover offer, NS officials announced yesterday.

The only difference in CP's latest proposal from the last offer is the inclusion of a contingent value right (CVR), NS officials said in a press release. Yesterday's proposal did not change terms of CP's Dec. 7th offer, which the NS board rejected unanimously, and did not address "substantial regulatory risks and uncertainties inherent in the proposed combination," the release stated.

Norfolk Southern Corp. sent a letter today to Canadian Pacific Chief Executive Officer E. Hunter Harrison informing him that the NS board rejects CP's updated buyout offer.

The letter, which NS filed as an 8-K statement, makes official the comments NS officials made in a press release last week after CP updated its original merger proposal. 

Note: This sidebar in the December issue was written prior to NS' rejection of CP's initital buyout offer, CP's second offer, NS' subsequent rebuff of that proposal and several other maneuvers. Follow this link to read the latest on the proposed CP-NS merger.

Norfolk Southern Corp. and Canadian Pacific were business partners that executed the D&H line sale, and now they might become permanent partners.

By This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Managing Editor

When it comes to real estate, it’s often more advantageous to own a property than to rent or lease it. One of the benefits: A property can be controlled according to an owner’s wishes rather than a landlord’s dictates.

by This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., managing editor

It's several minutes past 2 p.m. on Oct. 4 at Norfolk Southern Corp.'s headquarters. Mark Manion enters a conference room, takes a seat, sets his Blackberry down on a table and apologizes for being late. He also jokes about not being able to shake hands.

Clifford, who retired from NS in 1987, was the railroad’s advertising manager in 1982 when Southern Railway and Norfolk and Western Railway merged and sought a new logo and brand image for the combined organization. He worked with various company officers and advisors to review about 200 logo prototypes before settling on a bold, slanted “NS” followed by five speedlines.

But Clifford believed something was missing. In a recent interview, he recalled that an animal was considered to give the logo an “instant visual.”

The conditional tense reigned supreme during the reporting of a number of stories in this month's issue — from the cover piece on Norfolk Southern Railway's $2.5 billion Crescent Corridor, which the Class I plans to establish via the public-private partnership route ("If funding falls into place, then the 2,500-mile domestic intermodal corridor will, too.") to our RailTrends summit recap ("If railroads can hold off the D.C. threats while embracing the D.C. opportunities, productivity and earnings growth will be explosive, and marketshare opportunities in medium and short lengths of haul will be dramatic.") to our rail-car repair market update. The latter story's slant: If the economy picks up, so will repair work.

A lot of the "if/then" talk is tied to economic recovery, whenever and however it'll begin its creep, but not all of it. Every railroad seeking a public funding commitment of any kind is having conditional conversations with the governmental powers that be and, increasingly, the communities they serve: "If you fund this project, XYZ benefits will come."

For more than a decade, the commonwealth of Virginia has sought to add lanes to Interstate 81 to relieve heavy truck congestion. The 846-mile highway stretches 323 miles in Virginia — the longest I-81 segment in any state.

Virginia most recently considered a plan to add two lanes to the interstate commonwealth-wide. To be funded by tolls, the project would cost about $13 billion over 20 years.