GRAND FORKS, N.D. — BNSF Railway Co., the largest railroad in North Dakota, is furloughing some employees across its network, including in Grand Forks and elsewhere in the region.
“Customers’ volumes in the near term have come down somewhat from their prior estimates; as a result we are having to adjust our workforce demand numbers down to match volume and the work required to move that volume,” BNSF spokeswoman Amy McBeth wrote in an email. “As part of that, we are reducing the hiring plans for the next several months and are, unfortunately, having to temporarily furlough some of our employees at different locations across our network.”
McBeth said BNSF expects to call the furloughed employees back “as soon as business needs require,” though she didn’t have any specific figures on affected employees by region.
But Jim Chase, the North Dakota legislative director for the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation union (SMART) said almost 200 operating employees have been furloughed in four locations: 11 in Grand Forks, 40 in Dilworth, Minn., 60 in Mandan, N.D., and 71 in Minot, N.D. Operating employees responsible for running the trains, like engineers and conductors, he said.
“I’ve never seen cuts this deep,” Chase said.
Chase added many of those employees have been hired within the last year. BNSF hired about 7,000 new employees to meet increased shipment demands.
“The railroads are really reactive when they hire,” Chase said. “If it looks like they need people, they start hiring and hiring and hiring.”
The workforce reductions coincide with recent decreases in traffic. Total U.S. rail traffic for the week ending May 16 was down 2.9 percent compared to the same week last year, according to the Association of American Railroads.
Chase said BNSF has offered maintenance work to furloughed employees.
Phillip Qualy, a union official in Minnesota, said they didn’t have information on the number of furloughed employees there.
“We understand that BNSF still has new-hire classes slotted this month,” he wrote in an email. “We expect the regional economic slowdown in (the) rail sector to subside.”
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