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Anyone who has read Tom Wolfe’s book on the early space age The Right Stuff or has seen the movie knows what the above line is all about:  without funding, you can’t make the spectacular things happen.  In the case of the space program, you needed the attention of the people providing the funds, i.e.

Well, it's that time of year again. Time to think about the many talented women we work with and for and consider nominating one of them as Outstanding Woman of the Year.

As the saying goes, “be careful what you wish for, because you might get it.”  Right now, we, as an industry, are getting what we wished for.  What is it, you ask?

So here I am at my desk writing the annual “What happened at the ASLRRA Annual Convention” piece.  Let me get the usual niceties out of the way first:  Alan Matheson did a spectacular job chairing the event, and major thanks to all of the volunteers, staff, and others who made Connections (pun intended) in San Diego another great ASLRRA event.Now that I have that out of the way, what were the big stories at the ALSRRA 2014 Connections?For me there were two:  one industry wide, and the other personal. 

Both rail shippers and rail carriers are paying a price for one of the worst winter weather seasons in recent history.

I’ve written in the past about how the ASLRRA’s Connections conference is truly a group effort when it comes to making things happen when we are on site.  The volunteers, led by Judy Petry, are a well drilled and efficient machine when it comes to making this meeting happen.  All of the people who volunteer their time to the cause while also trying to make sure they attend the sessions they need to deserve a whole lot of thanks, but in this blog I am going to give my thanks to two people who really giv

This one snuck up on me.  It’s not like I wasn’t involved, or not paying attention to the calendar, but here we are just about two weeks from heading out to San Diego for the ASLRRA 2014 Connections.  Wow.  The crates are packed and shipping out today, I’ve been reviewing presentations for the correct spelling of ASLRRA, and all of those little things that may make up a small part of the entire experience are starting to take their final form.If you haven’t made plans to be in San Diego yet, what are you waiting for? 

As a user of rail trails and someone who does volunteer work locally on converting abandoned rail lines into walking/biking trails, I read with interest the Supreme Court’s ruling last week in a pivotal rails-to-trails case.The rails-to-trails movement was definitely dealt a setback when Supreme Court justices ruled 8-1 that essentially government easements used for railbeds expired when the railroads went out of business. The U.S.

As we go through our careers, we have mentors who teach us the correct way to do our jobs and guide us on our career paths.  If you are truly fortunate, you also end up with someone who will take you under their wing and teach you things that take you further in a career than just what a mentor can do.  When the news came out yesterday that we had  lost Maggie Silver, I lost just that person.My history with Maggie goes back a number of years before I actually met her in 1998.  My father had beco

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