Preserve Rail Competition
The Case for Preserving Rail Competition, Customer Choice and Supply Chain Resilience
Learn how the proposed UP-NS merger could affect freight rail competition, customer options and the efficiency of North America’s supply chains.
Learn how the proposed UP-NS merger could affect freight rail competition, customer options and the efficiency of North America’s supply chains.
Recent developments:
BNSF has reaffirmed its opposition to the proposed Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern merger in a recent filing with the Surface Transportation Board and outlined conditions it would seek if the merger is approved. While intended to address specific harms, BNSF maintains that no conditions can fully offset the merger’s impact on competition and customers.
Why we’re speaking up
BNSF is focused on serving customers, investing in our network and competing to earn business every day. But when a proposed transaction could fundamentally reshape the competitive landscape of freight rail, it is important to engage in the discussion.
More than a year after the merger was announced, a central question remains unresolved: How does reducing the number of Class I rail competitors and creating a railroad that would carry roughly half of U.S. freight rail traffic preserve and enhance competition for customers, communities and the U.S. economy?
What’s at stake
1. Unmatched market power reduces customer choice
A combined UP-NS would control an unprecedented 50% of U.S. originated rail shipments. For customers, that means fewer options, more captive traffic, greater exposure to higher rates and less meaningful remedy when something goes wrong.
2. Market power drives higher rates
A post-merger UP-NS would control roughly 70% of chemical shipments to and from Texas, 85% of intermodal shipments to and from the Northeast and to and from Indiana and 55% of farm product shipments to and from Kansas. According to the American Chemistry Council, rail rates at single-served member plants have risen 10 times faster over the past 15 years than at facilities served by more than one railroad.
3. Integration puts the supply chain at risk
UP’s last merger — with the Southern Pacific in 1996 — produced a service meltdown that took years to unwind, forced Gulf Coast factory shutdowns and cost shippers an estimated $100 million per month in delays. A much smaller, more recent merger caused months of service problems across a limited area. A UP-NS integration would touch the entire U.S. rail network.
The UP-NS merger by the numbers
A snapshot of market concentration in critical shipping markets
A better way — collaboration, not consolidation
Railroads do not need a merger to deliver more for customers. BNSF has expanded service through partnership — with CSX on new coast-to-coast intermodal service, with J.B. Hunt on Quantum, and with other carriers and ports on faster inland service — while preserving the competitive options customers rely on.
If commercial partnerships and access agreements can deliver these benefits, why is a merger of this magnitude necessary?
Opposition is broad and growing
As more stakeholders evaluate the proposed merger, concerns continue to mount. Customers, employees, industry groups and public officials have voiced opposition, warning that reduced rail competition could limit choice, weaken service protections and affect supply chains across the country.
See the growing opposition
Your voice matters
This proceeding will shape freight rail for decades. Decision-makers need to hear from the customers, businesses and communities who live with the real-world impact of reduced competition.