Articulation points

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

(Bear with me a second)

In The North American Railroad, its origin, evolution, and geography by James Vance Jr., he gives a lot of discussion to articulation points in railroading. When you stop to think about them it explains a lot of why railroading is what it is.

My explanation of articulation points would be something like this: If railroad A was a tree, all traffic would flow down from the branches (branch lines), to the trunk (main lines), ending up at the ground (articulation point). From there, traffic would go to railroad B at the articulation point, up the trunk, and out to the branches for final distribution. That part I can grasp.

The articulation points highlighted by Vance are at: New Orleans, Memphis,St. Louis, Chicago, Louiseville, Cincinnati, and Washington, D.C.(?)

Most all seem to be where rail traffic meets rvier or lake traffic, or where one railroad region meets another: west/east, southeast/northeast.

Are these the only articulation points, or just the major ones? Do articulation points come in all sizes? Do they come and go? For example are there places that were articulation points when the Milwaukee Road was around, but aren’t now? Are ther articulation points in the future, that haven’t developed yet? Is this related to the idea of gateways?

Thoughts?

note: If you want to get deep into railroad history and economics, read The North American Railroad, its origin, evolution, and geography by James Vance Jr… You’ll like it.

2

I’ve never heard the term articulation point before, but if there ever was one in Canada it would be Winnipeg, Manitoba. At one time the CPR had the largest railroad yard under one owner in the world there (before WWII, I think), just handling its’ own and interchange business. It is where the lines from eastern Canada came together and then fanned out all over western Canada. CN’s predecessor’s did the same thing before CN was ever formed on almost as large a scale in total.

AgentKid

3

Murphy -

This is not a comprehensive reply, but just kind of nibbling around the edges:

1.) Yes - “See the ‘gateways’ discussion thread” was my first thought.

2.) I don’t have a copy of the book handy, but I’m pretty sure that in the middle or further back there’s a map of the articulation points, with some being differentiated with larger or darker circles, and others being smaller or lighter. Have you seen that map (yet) ?

3.) I’d say this is another flexible definition and concept that comes in different sizes, and (like some “balance points”) does change and evolve over time. The 7 cities that you list - that would be of of what date (if you can tell ?)

4.) Note that of the 7 cities listed, the 1st 4 are in a South-to-North line along the Mississippi River, and the last 3 are in a West-to-East line along the Ohio River and then the Potomac.

5.) I’m not real conversant with the limits of the old ICC rate bureau territories - are the 2 lines that I’ve noted above related to the limits of same ?

6.) The 3 in the E-W direction are the weakest from a water traffic interaction standpoint - Washington is essentially zero, and I don’t think Louisville was ever that great (but I could be wrong).

7.) Working with your defintion, though, I can see Washington from the several RR’s that interchanged passengers and freight there. And not to get carried-away with a “me too” plea, I nevertheless also suggest the following (in only rough geographic sequence) are entitled to the same or at least next-tier down status in the hierarchy of articulation points, for the reasons stated:

New York City - Atlantic Ocean interface, many RRs terminated there, general principles;

Albany, NY - many RR interch

4

Nothing from me to add to the discusssion of articulation points, but I did go to Amazon.com and looked at the reviews for this book. One review critical of the book said it was a very academic(university?) type book,with long wordy sentences, and hard to read more than a few pages a one sitting. Guess I won’t be adding this book to my collection.

5

Too complex a definition. It’s much simpler. Think of the dictionary definition of articulate in the sense of "a place where segments join and things bend." As in car routes can bend. It’s

6

The analogy of tree trunks and branches doesn’t make it for me, possibly because to go up another trunk would involve a reversal in direction–that usually doesn’t happen at these places.

I would agree that Omaha/Council Bluffs would have been an articulation point prior to about 1980, but it probably doesn’t qualify as such any more–at least not in any major sense. However, I’ll submit that North Platte probably does.

7

I’d agree with that assessment of Council Bluffs and North Platte.

RWM

8

Probably you haven’t heard it because it’s not a railway industry term, per se, though as a career railway person I grasped the meaning and value of the term as soon as I first heard Vance describe it. He coined the term as an analytical device to bring clarity and order to a complex and chaotic subject.

RWM

9

Well, it’s not a bathroom reader, that’s for sure. I’m a lumber salesman, but I’ve been doing ok with the long, wordy sentences. I just go slow.[:)]

10

Murphy;

What was the time frame on Vance’s articulation points?

I’m guessing Post 1960’s; based upon the points mentioned along the Mississippi River. Pre-60’s would necessarily include some ferry crossings as well, at some out of the way locations along the river, that are nwo history.

11

Since i have never read Vance I will go on these posts. Those points certainly are places to change directions or RRs.

My first thought in the reading of the first few posts is Choke points. The Mississippi river and Ohio points listed are certainly choke points. I’ve also worried about the choke points on the US railway system. I feel like a separate thread on choke points will be in the offing sometime in my future.

12

Doesn’t Vance define or explain his term, either in the text or in a glossary in the back ?

And what’s next ? [:-,] Are you going to ask what he meant by an “entrepo^t” ???

  • PDN.
13

Vance did not “coin” the term.

It is a well-known terminology used in transportation modeling and planning, including railroads, and has been in general use as a basic term used in network studies of any kind and usually pops up about the third year of business school in the operations management and modeling classes, in economics modeling classes, or in graduate school in mathematics. Railroads may have been a little slow in incorporating the “network” and “network economics” way of thinking, but once they did, they adopted the terminology used by, at that point in time, virtually all the rest of the commercial transportation industry and there are any number of professional papers on the subject over the past 20-30 years. “Articulation points” are a key element in supply chain analysis, for instance, and that is fundamentally and always an economic analysis informed by historical circumstance.

For the planner, the economic analysis often means trying to justify overcoming the historical circumstance, or at least explaining it. In Vance’s case, the idea is way outside of his area of training and expertise. Unfortunately, I have always found geographers to be trying to explain what they see on the maps using all sorts of terminologies which aren’t part of their field of training or expertise.

Vance’s book shows not one single reference, for instance, to any of the many learned papers published over the past three decades on the topic of articulation points and network economics. I don’t know how a writer get

14

Algorithm - Welcome to the Forums !

Quite an impressive entry for your first post, too. You seem to be as qualified in that field as RWM is in his, and others in theirs. [tup] (That’s intended as a compliment, so there’s no confusion on that point.)

I too had been thinking that a network analogy would be better, but was having a hard time thinking of something that would resonate with most members here. From my professional standpoint as a civil engineer, a “Hardy Cross analysis” of a water supply and distribution system would be close, as would a highway traffic generation and routing study, or a perhaps the principles for the selection and set-up a finite element structural analysis or a Triangular Irregular Network (“TIN”) for depicting, analyzing, and modeling topographic features - but likely not many others would understand those examples. Would saying that articulation points are similar to the airline’s hubs in their “hub-and-spoke” traffic patterns be a useful analogy ?

Otherwise, can you suggest a book, magazine, or other publication (such as a “white paper”) that would be accessible and comprehensible to those of us here who are interested in such things from a railroad and logistics perspective ? As far as the higher math that usually permeates such treatises goes, I generally can’t derive or “prove” it - but I can follow along in a general way, and usually pick up pretty well on at least the qualitative aspects of the analysis and the general conclusions and principles, etc. Plus, there are now usually ways to ask follow-ups for clarifications, etc. - such as this Forum.

Again, welcome. Looking forward to your future contributions.

  • Paul North.
15

( At last, I’ve found my talent in life: taking easy concepts and making them complicated.[(-D])

Rate territory boundries? I thought I understood that a car coming into Denver from the west could go on to Chicago on several different routes. But, wasn’t the rate the roads could charge from Denver to Chicago the same for all?

16

Well…I don’t think there was any kind of a timeframe attatched to the idea as such.

17

Welcome to the Forum Algorithm. [:)]

18

AAARRGGGG!!! [oX)] Don’t get me started on writers who have to throw in French phrases. I’m liable to go all Pepe LePew on you.[(-D]

19

Try “ecumene.” That’s a word not even in most dictionaries. In an economic geographer’s sense, it’s the “part of the world that matters.” The ecumene of a railroad is thus its “reasonably available traffic territory.” See A.M. Wellington.

RWM

20

The book is about the development of the North American Railway. That occured between 1820 and 1960. That’s the operable time period.

RWM