INFORMS Dallas 1997 Sponsor: Railroad Applications SIG

MC01.1 Logistics at Norfolk Southern Robert Lucas, David Lawson --- Norfolk Southern Corp., Roanoke, VA ,

We will describe the activities of the logistics unit at Norfolk¨ Southern that supports automotive customers.

MC01.2 Computer Simulation of Norfolk Southern Automobile Mixing Centers at Kansas City, Fostoria & Shelbyville Darin A. England, Erick D. Wikum --- Norfolk Southern Corp., 125 Spring Ave. NW, Atlanta, GA 30303 ,

We describe our Automod model, which simulates operations at any of¨ 3 Norfolk Southern 'mixing' centers, wherein automobiles are¨ unloaded, grouped by destination and reloaded. Together with¨ dedicated unit train service, these facilities are part of an¨ efficient automobile distribution network. We explain how the¨ results of our simulations have influenced business decisions¨ relating to design and operation of the facilities and network.

MC01.3 Computer Simulation of Norfolk Southern Automobile Mixing Center at Chicago Xingang Cheng, Ajith B. Wijeratne --- Norfolk Southern Corp., 125 Spring St. SW, MS 110, Atlanta, GA 30303 ,

We present results from our simulation model of the Chicago¨ automobile mixing center, one of 4 facilities in Norfolk Southern¨ Corporation's automobile distribution system. This model was¨ developed using Automod, a 3-D and true-scale simulation package and¨ is utilized to evaluate capacity and service levels and to determine¨ resource requirements for the mixing center through designed¨ experiments.

MD01.1 Quality Service Design & Reliable Service Marketing Using MultiRail Min Luo --- CONRAIL, 2001 Market St., 14-D, Philadelphia, PA 19101 , (mluo@ix.netcom.com)

MultiRail is a leading railroad service design and planning tool¨ used by almost every major railroad in North America. The proposed¨ system will extend its capability for designing and evaluating¨ service plans and overcome some of its inherited design limitations.¨ It will provide not only the regular service design functionality¨ for planning personnel, but also the capability for marketing/sales¨ people to check and verify the available capacity...

MD01.2 Visualizing the Freight Transportation Market Joseph Bryan --- Reebie Associates, , , (reebieassc@aol.com)

Market intelligence about freight traffic is used by carriers to¨ plan operations and strategy, by shippers to gauge logistics¨ opportunities and by governments to guide policy, investment and¨ economic development. Reebie Associates has been the leading¨ commercial supplier of freight market flow data for almost 2¨ decades. A new visual database system is under development by a¨ Reebie-lead team, supported in part by federal R&D investment...

MD01.3 Pricing & Product Mix Optimization in Freight Transportation Markets Michael F. Gorman --- Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad, 3017 Lou Menk Drive, Ft. Worth, TX 76131 ,

Pricing strategies may be used to address the chronic imbalance of¨ traffic flows in freight transportation markets and improve profits.¨ However, the large number of markets combining to create the¨ imbalances makes it difficult to identify the most effective¨ combination of price changes to achieve this goal...

MD01.4 Geographic Information Systems & Vehicle Routing Lawrence D. Bodin --- Univ. of MD, Coll. of Bus. & Mgmt., College Park, MD 20742 ,

We describe key features of a GIS, show how a GIS can be used for¨ routing vehicles and describe why VRPs imbedded within a GIS can¨ have different ways of achieving cost minimization than other¨ classes of VRPs. Computational experiences in solving VRPs imbedded¨ within a GIS will also be presented.

ME01.1 Designing an Operating Plan to Respond to the Customer's Needs Bruce W. Patty, Dharma Acharya --- MCGI, 185 N Redwood Dr., Ste. 200, San Rafael, CA 94903 , (bruce@mcgi.com)

CSX Transporation has recently developed a new operating plan in¨ order to respond to the needs of the customer. While railroads¨ continuously adjust their operating plan, this development process¨ started with a 'clean sheet' of paper. We will discuss how the¨ customer's needs were identified, the process used to develop a new¨ operating plan, the tools used to support this process and lessons¨ learned.

ME01.2 Determining Customer's Needs: The Railroad Dilemma John J. Gradek, William H. VanMarter --- Canadian Pacific Railway, 401 9th Ave. SW, Suite 4047, Calgary, Alberta, T2P 4Z4 , Canada

Canadian Pacific Railway is undergoing a major transition in its¨ operating plan development process. The traditional planning process¨ typically involved the railway operating functions transportation¨ and field operations with the resulting product being offered to the¨ commercial functions for advice to the railway process requires a¨ thorough understanding of customer expectations and subsequent¨ design of a plan supporting the specifics of demand...