I will attempt to clarify a rather “interesting” indirect exchange involving Union Pacific’s Jim Vena, who hopes to one day head the first East-West U.S. transcontinental Class I railroad, and BNSF’s Katie Farmer, who prefers that Uncle Pete doesn’t get to cross the Mississippi River and repaint Norfolk Southern’s black and white locomotives yellow. I don’t think Jim would consent to a new yellow and black combined scheme. It would look too much like a bumblebee, and he most certainly wouldn’t want snarky references to the merger being “bumbled” if things go south, provided the STB approves this ginormous transaction. Besides, bumblebees are docile (for bees) fuzzy little creatures interested only in flowers and procreation. That description does not fit UP, which the late Railway Age Senior Editor Gus Welty long-ago described as “an 800-pound gorilla in a stall shower.”
So, what’s all the latest buzz about (pun intended)? Let’s look at it in three steps.
Among BNSF’s red flags: “300 intermodal lanes [will be] eliminated if [the] merger is approved. After the [most recent] major round of mergers [in the late 1990s], 90 intermodal facilities closed, resulting in several hundred fewer intermodal lane options and communities permanently losing their intermodal access.”
Step 2: Jim Vena was asked about this at the Nov. 11 Baird 2025 Global Industrial Conference in Chicago. He refuted BNSF’s claims (this is from the transcript):
“Bottom line is they (Berkshire Hathaway) got $330 billion of cash available. If they wanted to buy something, they have it. It is up to them … they put out a two-pager, and I have it sitting on my bathroom wall next to the sink with the toothpaste. It says we are going to shut down 300 lanes. I go, really? Why would we shut off 300 lanes? First of all, we do not have 300 [intermodal] lanes. There [are] not that many lanes, like one that goes north out of LA, another that goes to Chicago, another that goes to Memphis, another goes to Atlanta. Like, what the heck lanes do we have? I had to ask Kenny [Rocker], are you hiding 290 lanes from me that I do not understand? [BNSF] said we are going to shut down that many. I laugh. I find it interesting that Berkshire is coming after us that hard. In fact, why do I call them Berkshire? I will be honest so anybody can hear it. We are actually Union Pacific and we own a railroad. I am the CEO of Union Pacific Railroad (Yes, Jim we know. No need to make the obvious less obscure). What is humorous about it is some people at Burlington Northern Santa Fe were taken aback that I would call them Berkshire. Last time I looked, that is the publicly traded company, just like Union Pacific. I have to have some fun too.” (Don’t we all?)
Vena also had some comments about CPKC, which is also opposed to the merger:
“Service agreements are good. You can see what happened with the service agreement that Norfolk Southern had with Canadian Pacific over the Meridian Speedway. Kansas City Southern … used to allow an 11,000-foot train to operate. All of a sudden, when Canadian Pacific took over, in the [past] few months, [it] decided to cut back the train size that was always handled before the merger and even since the merger. At the end of the day, that is the problem. [CPKC] is saying to us, ‘you are going to have to run two trains at Union Pacific.’ If we have to, we will run two trains. That is the way it is. The first question we asked [CPKC] was, why? What changed from five years of being able to run an 11,000-foot train from L.A. all the way into that market, and now you cannot? That is what you have to be careful with some of those deals. They break down…”
Step 3 (and here’s where it gets a bit confusing): BNSF on Nov. 12 issued a statement from Katie Farmer in response to Vena’s comments:
“At the Baird 55th Annual Conference Tuesday in Chicago, Union Pacific Corp. made comments indicating that [more than] 300 intermodal lanes will not be closed where there is an origin or destination currently on BNSF and Norfolk Southern or Union Pacific and CSX if the merger is approved. ‘I’m sure the nation’s rail customers are relieved that UP is committing to keep all current intermodal lanes open if their merger with NS is approved,’ said Katie Farmer, President and CEO, BNSF Railway. ‘UP highlighted in prior rail industry mergers that the new merged railroad usually raises rates on competing interchange partners to the point of making those lanes economically uncompetitive.”
Now, here’s the source of my initial confusion:
“Yesterday’s announcement is consistent with Union Pacific’s position during the last major merger between Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern where Union Pacific’s filings at the Surface Transportation Board made the following arguments opposing the merger of the two smallest Class I railroads: ‘If the Board does authorize the transaction, shippers should not have to rely on CPKC’s “good faith.” The Board should impose conditions to prevent the reduction of competitive options at gateways, particularly the Laredo Gateway. (UP Comments and Request for Conditions, Canadian Pacific Railway—Control—Kansas City Southern, FD Docket No. 36500, at 9.) In short, Applicants would face enormous post-merger pressure to divert traffic from existing KCSM interline service to CPKC single-line service using strategies that reduce shippers’ existing competitive options… CPKC would have the ability to implement such anticompetitive strategies by raising rates shippers must pay for interline service or degrading the quality of service shippers receive when using interline service. Id. at 26.’”
I thought, OK, what do the CPKC merger and UP’s comments to the STB a few years ago have to do with UP acquiring NS? To me, people reading Katie’s statement could infer that BNSF may be changing or modifying its position on the UP+NS merger. Is there something I’m not getting here?
So, I pulled a Ricky Ricardo and said to BNSF, “You got some ’splainin to do!”
BNSF VP Corporate Relations Zak Andersen was more than happy to provide some context for my pointy little head. In a nutshell, Katie’s observations and reference to CPKC have to do with rates. Money. It’s that simple. The issue is not UP physically shutting down an intermodal lane. Rather, it’s UP ensuring the lane is “economically open.” Take the Laredo/Nuevo Laredo U.S. Mexico border gateway, the busiest, for example. CPKC owns and operates it. UP has trackage rights. The comparable rates one or the other charges can differ greatly.
So, according to BNSF, a UP intermodal lane can remain open. The question is, will there be too much of a price spread between what UP can charge (presumably much lower) and what BNSF can charge on a competing lane that will give an unfair competitive advantage to UP?
That’s what UP meant about CPKC to the STB during that merger process (and you can download and read Canadian Pacific’s response at the time, below). BNSF is citing UP’s comments as an example for UP+NS, though to be honest it wasn’t made very clear in Katie’s statement.
Now it is—I think.
“In what other network industry requiring cooperation to meet customer wants do participants so frequently act with hostility toward each other? May we all live long enough to understand railroads.”
— Railway Age Capitol Hill Contributing Editor Frank N. Wilner
I’ll conclude with my two cents on use of the words “America” and “American” in Union Pacific’s descriptions of the merger. Perhaps you’ve noted that in many instances, I’ve substituted “United States” or “U.S.” in brackets. I’m married to an immigrant from Argentina, which is in South America. To me and my wife, “America” represents the entire Western Hemisphere—North America (Canada, U.S., Mexico), Central America (Panama, etc.) and South America (Argentina, Brazil, etc.). Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern would represent the first U.S. transcontinental, not the first American transcon. CPKC has always been correctly referred to as a North American transnational. CPKC and CN have Canadian transcons.
It’s up to Jim Vena and UP they wish to substitute “United States” for the “America,” which sounds more patriotic, in the name of accuracy. But the United States of America is a free country, and we can say what we want.
Within reason, of course. These days, nationalism—which is dangerous—is often mistaken for patriotism, which, applied to the United States, a multicultural nation established by immigrants, should be healthy, a source of pride.
