The decision to recommend mediation as the way to resolve disputes over selling branch lines was designed to avoid creating the impression that industry stakeholders couldn’t agree on anything, says Arthur Kroeger.
“It was part of an overall attempt to reduce the very adversarial tone of the working group reports,” he said last week.
The working group that looked at the issue of branch-line transfers recommended that disputes between sellers and buyers be resolved through binding arbitration. Only the railways dissented from that approach.
However, the Kroeger steering committee rejected that recommendation and instead opted for the railways’ proposal to set out formal negotiating guidelines and send unresolved issues for mediation. Arbitration would be used only if one party felt the other wasn’t acting in good faith.
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Kroeger said he urged the steering committee to look for compromises to resolve some of the issues that had divided the working groups.
He said the working group that looked at the branch-line issue was the most ideological and the most divided of the three working groups that studied the recommendations of justice Willard Estey.
Short-line supporters said it’s unfair the steering committee adopted the railways’ position, rather than the position supported by all the other stakeholders.
Kroeger said that reaction reflects the adversarial nature of the discussions in the working group.
