CN and Burlington Northern Santa Fe Reach Routing Protocol Agreement t

MONTREAL and FORT WORTH, Texas, Jan. 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CN and The Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Company (BNSF) announced today a routing protocol agreement to streamline their exchange of rail traffic at major gateways. BNSF is a subsidiary of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corporation .

Under the protocol, CN and BNSF have established a structured plan to direct rail traffic flows through the most efficient interchange locations, a change that will improve transit times and asset utilization for the customers of CN and BNSF. The new routing protocol will be implemented over a three- month period.

James Foote, CN's executive vice-president, sales and marketing, said: "We are pleased to be able to establish a routing protocol with the BNSF. This will create a more seamless service for the customers and generate more capacity for the railroads."

John Lanigan, BNSF's executive vice president and chief marketing officer, said: "As part of our effort to streamline the interchange process with all our service partners, this agreement will provide more consistent, dependable service for customers whose shipments move over both railways."

The major interchange points for traffic moving between CN and BNSF are Vancouver, B.C., Noyes, Minn., Superior, Wis., Chicago, Memphis, and New Orleans.

The routing protocol will result in a number of changes in traffic: * Traffic from the Canadian prairies will be consolidated at the Noyes interchange when moving to the western United States and at the Superior interchange when destined to the central United States and Texas. * Traffic moving to and from the south central United States will be interchanged at Memphis and at New Orleans, avoiding congestion in Chicago.

Canadian National Railway Company spans Canada and mid-America, from the Atlantic and Pacific oceans to the Gulf of Mexico, serving the ports of Vancouver, Prince Rupert, B.C., Montreal, Halifax, New Orleans, and Mobile, Ala., and the key cities of Toronto, Buffalo, Chicago, Detroit, Duluth, Minn./Superior, Wis., Green Bay, Wis., Minneapolis/St. Paul, Memphis, St. Louis, and Jackson, Miss., with connections to all points in North America.

BNSF operates one of the largest railroad networks in North America, with about 32,000 route miles covering 28 states and two Canadian provinces. The railway is among the world's top transporters of intermodal traffic, moves more grain than any other American railroad, transports the components of many of the products we depend on daily, and hauls enough low-sulphur coal to generate about ten percent of the electricity produced in the United States. BNSF is an industry leader in Web-enabling a variety of customer transactions at http://www.bnsf.com/ .