Model Train Journal

These delays seem to me to be linked to how the item is mailed and where it's mailed from. My West coast packages seem to arrive almost right on time - those are traveling by air to the nearest airport. Stuff going by truck from the eastern side of the country, all bets are off. Just got in a package (1st class) from Oregon that took 5 days; stuff that originated in Kentucky through Ohio to Hyattsville has disappeared into Baltimore. While going through the sorting station in Hyattsville is routine, my mail usually ends up traveling to Capitol Heights and then here. Baltimore? Got on the wrong truck??? Probably never see my decals........

United States Post Office, Washington, D. C., Christmas, 1938:



Some things just don't get any better.

I like those light fixtures!

It seems that the backlog on deliveries is slowly getting cleared out.

My package of milled clapboard priority mail 12/30 showed up yesterday!

I am still waiting for an ebay item won on 12dec20 and posted on 14dec20. It made it to Atlanta (with nothing in between) from Princeton, MA (by way of Alpha Centauri, I think) on 29dec20 and that is the last that it has been heard from.

Has some of the other "in transit" stuff gotten to its destinstion ?

rogruth wrote:Has some of the other "in transit" stuff gotten to its destinstion ?

Yes! Got 2 more packages in Sat., one of which I was very unsure about seeing.

A tanker that I won on 12dec20 finally arrived today, the tracking makes for some interesting reading:

January 19, 2021, 2:31 pm Delivered, Front Porch CHESTER, SC 29706
January 19, 2021, 7:33 am Out for Delivery CHESTER, SC 29706
January 19, 2021, 7:22 am Arrived at Post Office CHESTER, SC 29706
January 19, 2021, 5:15 am Departed USPS Regional Facility MID CAROLINA-CHARLOTTE NC DISTRIBUTION CENTER
January 19, 2021, 2:39 am Arrived at USPS Regional Facility MID CAROLINA-CHARLOTTE NC DISTRIBUTION CENTER
January 2, 2021 In Transit to Next Facility
December 29, 2020, 5:49 pm Arrived at USPS Regional Facility ATLANTA-PEACHTREE GA DISTRIBUTION CENTER
Originally stated: Processed through USPS Regional Facility ATLANTA-PEACHTREE GA DISTRIBUTION CENTER
December 14, 2020, 5:46 pm Departed Post Office PRINCETON, MA 01541
December 14, 2020, 3:45 pm USPS in possession of item PRINCETON, MA 01541
December 13, 2020, 5:26 pm Shipping Label Created, USPS Awaiting Item PRINCETON, MA 01541

I was told by my local postmaster " trailers sat in a Philly yard for 2 weeks. " A company that does contract work for the post office would drop off trailers to be unloaded. When things got to backed up inside. They just dropped the trailers on the street. That is why many times you see no tracking scan for days. Large facilities like philly had 50 or more trailers on back log. Packed and parked outside of town. Waiting for space in a postal loading dock. A driver wont sit and baby sit a trailer. He'll drop it and move on to the next job.

robert. wrote:I was told by my local postmaster " trailers sat in a Philly yard for 2 weeks. " A company that does contract work for the post office would drop off trailers to be unloaded. When things got to backed up inside. They just dropped the trailers on the street. That is why many times you see no tracking scan for days. Large facilities like philly had 50 or more trailers on back log. Packed and parked outside of town. Waiting for space in a postal loading dock. A driver wont sit and baby sit a trailer. He'll drop it and move on to the next job.

Isn't that how truckers make money?
Aren't most USPS employees contract or hourly?Makes no differece to them.

Outside companies deliver long distance truckloads of mail. Pintey Bowes is a company that delivers mail up and down i 95. They may drop a trailer at 30 st post office. Then head to NJ for another trailer and go to Jacksonville.

robert. wrote:Outside companies deliver long distance truckloads of mail. Pintey Bowes is a company that delivers mail up and down i 95. They may drop a trailer at 30 st post office. Then head to NJ for another trailer and go to Jacksonville.

Yes. It sounds as if the stuff is really "misplaced" somewhere other than between post offices.

rogruth wrote:My wife will receive several pair of shoes every week by mail, tries them on and returns 75%. The postage costs to me are far nicer than the trips to town would be just to find the shoes.

Roger, now just one minisle! I thought your wife's name was Ruthlane, NOT Imelda!

E7 wrote:

rogruth wrote:My wife will receive several pair of shoes every week by mail, tries them on and returns 75%. The postage costs to me are far nicer than the trips to town would be just to find the shoes.

Roger, now just one minisle! I thought your wife's name was Ruthlane, NOT Imelda!

OH darn. You found her out.

rogruth wrote:

E7 wrote:Roger, now just one minisle! I thought your wife's name was Ruthlane, NOT Imelda!

OH darn. You found her out.