I understand freight car advertising was banned in 1937 by the Interstate Commerce commission. Circa 2017, this seems like a rule that should be abolished. I don't understand the rationale for it's adoption in the first place. It would allow railroads to derive additional advertising revenue.
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How would a string of auto racks with CHEVROLET on the sides look on a siding serving the Ford Assembly Plant on the south side of Chicago? John in Lansing, ILL
With the plethora of today's graffiti 'artists' customizing anything that rolls on rails...to the obliteration or ruination of any original paint/graphics...what's to be gained in the return to billboard equipment?....and/or repeal of any legislation prohibiting the same??
Besides, the animated/electronic roadside billboards along our highways, ugly as they are, serve a better purpose for advertising to the masses. I mean, how many major automobile thoroughfares really come close to or parallel active railroad lines nowadays? Furthermore, do you really think vehicle drivers/passengers are paying attention to passing trains?....rather than their hand-held electronic gizmos?.............while rolling along or sitting at a grade crossing?.......REALLY??
And pedestrian/resident attention to passing trains? Right.......we're all sitting on our porches in our rockers waiting for the passing train to find out what brands of sausage and cheese we should buy nowadays?
OTOH, much as sports arenas (and fairground structures) have taken to raising $$$$$ by selling the stadium/structure name to the highest bidder, maybe there's something to the idea?
Probably not.
IMHO, of course.
KD
I'm not saying the practice is effective. I don't know how much revenue it would add. Every additional dollar helps to preserve a railroad job. I would leave that to the free market to determine. The regulation seems to be unnecessarily intrusive, which offends my libertarian instincts. After all, the railroads did without such a rule for a hundred years.
Tommy posted:I understand freight car advertising was banned in 1937 by the Interstate Commerce commission. Circa 2017, this seems like a rule that should be abolished. I don't understand the rationale for it's adoption in the first place. It would allow railroads to derive additional advertising revenue.
This subject is discussed in today's MTH daily newsletter which can be accessed on their website.
Bill
I realize the OP asked about reefers but, liability plays into the absence of company names on private rail cars now too. If you look at photos of tank cars in trains in the 1950's and even into the 1960's; chemical companies would have special paint schemes and company names on their tank cars. This is almost never done anymore.
The chemical company I work for discontinued the practice about 20 or so years ago when we had a single car involved in a derailment. Even though our car wasn't breached and never posed a threat; the local media where the accident occurred took special pains to show the car with our name on it. The publicity along with our being drug into multiple lawsuits was unwelcome to say the least.
After that; it became a standing instruction when one of our cars went into the shop; paint over the company name.
Curt
Billboard displays on freight cars were terminated by legal action brought about by the shippers themselves. Swift got mad because Hormel meat was shipped in a Swift car (this is only a example). Budweiser got mad because some other beer was shipped in a car bearing Budweisers name. That being the case the ICC issued a ruling that no more billboard freight cars were to be allowed.
Tommy posted:I'm not saying the practice is effective. I don't know how much revenue it would add. Every additional dollar helps to preserve a railroad job. I would leave that to the free market to determine. The regulation seems to be unnecessarily intrusive, which offends my libertarian instincts. After all, the railroads did without such a rule for a hundred years.
Whether or not this regulation made any sense, the whole point of antitrust law is that the free market does not work on its own. Many decades of experience showed that once markets became national in scale, without any regulation companies would conspire to fix prices and eliminate competition.
Antitrust law and regulation tries to ensure that competition remains in the market, and then lets the market do its job.
there are currently commuter passenger cars with full side advertisements on them.
New Jersey Transit has for several years, placed vinyl banner advertisements on their bi-level coaches. Lately, I've seen a couple examples where the entire side of the car is a vinyl wrap, with perforated areas where the windows are, of an advertisement.
the same as you'd see on local buses.
PRR Man posted:there are currently commuter passenger cars with full side advertisements on them.
New Jersey Transit has for several years, placed vinyl banner advertisements on their bi-level coaches. Lately, I've seen a couple examples where the entire side of the car is a vinyl wrap, with perforated areas where the windows are, of an advertisement.
the same as you'd see on local buses.
that is because they are only run in a limited area.
bigdodgetrain posted:PRR Man posted:there are currently commuter passenger cars with full side advertisements on them.
New Jersey Transit has for several years, placed vinyl banner advertisements on their bi-level coaches. Lately, I've seen a couple examples where the entire side of the car is a vinyl wrap, with perforated areas where the windows are, of an advertisement.
the same as you'd see on local buses.
that is because they are only run in a limited area.
And commuter trains and buses don't haul product. Only people.
Rusty
In 2008, the Wisconsin & Southern painted a 50' double plug door boxcar for an event sponsored by Sargento Cheese Mfg and honoring the city of Plymouth, Wisconsin. It's first load was Christmas trees.
It ran in a special train pulled by Soo Mikado 1003. To enter revenue service, the Sargento markings had to be painted out.
Rusty
Rusty Traque posted:In 2008, the Wisconsin & Southern painted a 50' double plug door boxcar for an event sponsored by Sargento Cheese Mfg and honoring the city of Plymouth, Wisconsin. It's first load was Christmas trees.
It ran in a special train pulled by Soo Mikado 1003. To enter revenue service, the Sargento markings had to be painted out.
Rusty
Great looking either way but an out dated law in my opinion.
The 'billboard reefer ban' gets a bit complicated, but basically advertising on cars that a company owned or leased wasn't banned, it was regulated. One restriction was that lettering couldn't be more than (IIRC) 16" high. Previously, it had been OK to letter a car you owned or leased with letters as tall as the car - like a rolling billboard (hence the name).
As was noted in an earlier post, the issue was that company A would ask a railroad to provide a reefer to carry it's product, but if the car the railroad provided was from company B (company A's chief rival) and carried company B's name or the name of it's product in huge six foot high "billboard" style lettering, company A would refuse the car and the railroad would have to find another one. This meant the railroad often only got a load one way, and had to send many reefers back empty that could have been hauling freight (and earning revenue) for the railroad.
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