Out of hibernation: after hitting bottom in 2002, freight car orders are on an upswing that's expected to last through at least 2009. Builders also are offering new models to supplant older technology

Railway Age, Sept, 2004 by Marybeth Luczak

"We know that these [niche-market] ears are not going to produce orders of 5,000 a year, but we're hopeful these areas will grow," he says.

* Trinity. Trinity's latest project is insulated boxcars. "We're working with the railroads and TTX to come up with a [car design] specification to attract the market for products that must be kept cool at sustained temperatures, like beer and wine," says Martin Graham, president of Trinity Rail Operations. "Beyond that, our aim has been continuous improvement to our existing designs. We established a field service department whose goal is to watch the unloading and loading of product and identify incremental changes that will help make the process easier for customers. The bulk of car orders are from existing product designs, so continuing improvements in effectiveness and efficiency are important."

* Union Tank Car. While tank car design and construction has remained fairly consistent over the years due to standardization, upgrades to 286K GRL capacity continue, according to William Snelgrove, vice president-sales and customer service. The company is seeing much growth in 34,000-gallon pressure cars (LPGs; pictured, p. 63) to replace older units--many of which were built in the 1960s-and 30,000-gallon, non-piped, non insulated general purpose cars for the transport of ethanol-currently a three-billion-gallon-a-year market expected to rise to 6.5-billion gallons annually.

* Wabtec Corp. Work proceeds on Wabtec's new intermodal ramp car (pictured, p. 69) to keep up with traffic growth. "We developed the technology needed to make this car feasible so it could be built by anyone," says Jim Pontious, vice president-special projects. Two Trinity-built prototypes have accumulated a combined 150,000 miles of revenue service since testing began on the Canadian National network more than a year ago. "We've been able to get some valuable information from the service and we're now improving the design," Pontious says. The objective, he explains, is to ensure the smooth loading/unloading of trailers. Wabtec is currently in talks with CN, Union Pacific, and Norfolk Southern to start revenue service in the U.S. next year.