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GE to slash 250 workers at North Fort Worth locomotive plant

GE Manufacturing Solutions has begun laying off about one-third of its workforce at its locomotive plant in North Fort Worth, just west of Texas Motor Speedway due to a slump in freight rail shipping. In all, about 250 hourly and salaried employees will lose their jobs at the plant, which now produces nine to 10 freight locomotives a week.

Production at the plant, which opened in early 2013, will drop so much that the company said in a statement it will need only 50 per cent "of the site's available capacity."

In June, the remaining employees will start working a 32-hour week, the company said. The reduced working week will save about 70 jobs, the company has confirmed, report Dallas News.

The layoffs will be completed by April 3, according to a letter filed February 1 with the Texas Workforce Commission. "It is expected to be permanent," the letter said.

GE issued a statement saying the North American rail market continues to be challenging and that freight rail volume has dropped 4.5 per cent from last year. "More than 15 per cent of the nation's freight locomotive fleet remains parked," the statement said.

In July 2016, the company produced its 1,000th locomotive at the Fort Worth plant, and at that time, GE said it had about 700 employees at the plant.

The company has now produced 1,200 locomotives here and continues to work through a backlog of orders, said Tim Bader, a GE spokesman in Fort Worth. "It's been pretty tough in the freight rail industry for quite some time," Mr Bader said. "Unfortunately, it has impacted our volume."