Thread by @JerryCap

1) Just Finished Railroader:

If Hunter Harrison were alive today we would surely see him wander the world fixing every railroad one at a time and in turn improving an important piece of each countries critical infrastructure.

An American born Canadian Hero.

2) Some Quotes to follow:

3) Drink your good wine today 👇

"I worked my ass off all my life so I could afford to drink a good bottle of wine, and now I can't drink it"

4) "They are scared shitless of you, how do you expect then to talk to you when they are afraid of you?"

5) "You either loved him or you hated him. The people at the top hated him."

6) The first Hunter Harrison Turnaround: Illinois Central 1989

Operating Ratio 98 to 74 in 24 months

7) He was forecasting the railroad equivalent of a lunar landing

8) After the turnaround at IC a merger with KSU was speculated and in 1994 the "Hunter Harrison" legend was born.

"IC was going to send a SWAT team to KCS"

9) The merger fell through which paved the way for an IC takeover by Canadian National Railway ( $CNR ) and the start of "twenty five years of railroad superstardom" for Hunter Harrison

10) What is that Phil Fisher Quote Again?

"Quaint to think that the two sides were fussing over a dollar here or a dollar there... $CNR market captilization increased from $2 billion in 1995 to $78.5 billion in 2018"

11) Trucks "Ubered" Railways

12) My first thought...

At Pershing Square it takes a 1000 hours to figure out Hunter Harrison can turnaround a railroad?

Doesn't matter, a homerun for Ackman.

14) The $CP turnaround

15) The Anatomy of a Railroad Turnaround:

KPIs

Operating Ratio
Train Length
Train Speed
Terminal Dwell
Train Weight
Accidents per Train Mile
Employee Count

16) When he was working mostly remotely from an Oxygen Tank at $CSX:

"They could only hear him, which left the rest to their imaginations. It was the railroad God on the line"

17) The final turnaround

18) "He'd become bitter... I dunno if he feels like he's special... He has so much to be thankful for."

19) At the end, this story was to me, more than anything, sad.

20) Highly recommend and thanks to @howardgreennews for writing this book.
amazon.com/dp/1989025048/…