![]() Northgate did a pilot run, sending cars south, before going into operation. By the fall of 2014, the twin-loop track was set, and two grain bins were on site. Northgate was built as a shuttle facility, with the goal of filling 110 cars within 15 hours once they’re on site. A month or two into the job, he shifted to managing the daily grain operations. He started at Northgate before the terminal was built, organizing construction. Johnston worked in industrial construction for over 20 years, building everything from gas plants to high rises on the West Coast. “To become a premier transloader, transload facilities must consistently provide customers with responsive, reliable, quality service that is routinely above and beyond the norm,” she says. Lewis explains the designation acknowledges the few companies that demonstrate the highest level of supply chain management. Earlier this year, BNSF awarded Northgate the Premier Transloader designation. Nielsen adds that BNSF sends Northgate business as well. Without their traffic and service “we wouldn’t be able to do what we do.” Ceres employees talk to BNSF about what they want to do and BNSF responds by getting them more cars, or more BNSF staff, Johnston says. The goal is to position BNSF to “quickly add manpower, equipment and supplies to address service interruptions caused by weather.”īNSF also recently added another locomotive to each grain train in the northern corridor, so that there are now five locomotives per train in the winter. Lewis says that BNSF creates a winter preparation plan each year for each division. “For our agricultural customers, we have ombudsmen throughout our network whose jobs are to listen and communicate with customers,” she says. Lewis says that while BNSF participates in industry-led arbitration and abides by regulations on both sides of the border, it’s more effective to listen to customers and work with them before an issue needs escalation. Generally within a half day, we’re getting something back on what we can do, how we can manage it, what they’ll do for us,” says Johnston. “Any issues we have, we just bring them up right away. While they sometimes run into delays because of weather or other issues, communication between BNSF and Ceres is good, he says. “BN has been excellent, to be put in a nutshell,” says Johnston. Jeremy Johnston, facility manager, says the best part of that visit was having people with plenty of management and logistical experience offering suggestions. That’s top-down in the company,” says Jeremy Nielsen, general manager for the site.īNSF brass has visited Northgate. “I think the only thing that I can say is they’re very customer-service oriented. last year.”Īsk the Northgate facility’s management about the rail service, and their praise for BNSF is effusive. “We moved 45 per cent of all grain cars loaded in the U.S. on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) line.īNSF is the largest grain mover in the world, and hauled 1.1 million cars of ag commodities in 2017, writes Jessa Lewis, BNSF spokesperson, via email. Rather than hooking into one of Canada’s main railways and shipping product to the West Coast, Ceres exports Canadian grain into the U.S. ![]() The facility’s border-straddling location, southeast of Estevan, is key to its logistics. While the terminal and most of Ceres’ twin-loop track is in Canada, part of the track is south of the border. If you had a good arm, you might be able to stand outside the Ceres Northgate Terminal and wing a baseball from Saskatchewan into North Dakota.
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