I have to agree and disagree.Like ironhorseman said back in the days before 1950 you needed trains to go everywhere.The railroads knew what on time ment as if the train was due at 7:15 thats when it came not sometime that day.The NKP used an engine called a Berkshire to fly down the line to get stuff from Chicago to Buffalo.I would have loved to see them run and hear the stories from my stepgrandfather.However I do agree that modern technology is helping the railroads.With all the run through power and having 6 trains go by you in 30 minutes you don’t know whats next.So bring your camera.Take pictures leave footprints and as always stay safe.
Joe
Modelcar Some very good comments there. Not only was everything with wheels used for passenger travel it also applies to freight service. The war saved, for a while at least, many a railroad by carrying the extra traffic needed for the war effort.
But the good times didn’t last. And unfortunately neither did many of the railroads of that era. And when they left their character, spice, style, nature, and charm all went down with them–lost forever except to memory . (If you were fortunate and were able to experience them in the first place).
Stay Safe and Look, Listen and Live
Don’t forget the troops
…A new era began after WWII. All kinds of conditions and situations changed. It was about like we started over…! Transportation systems included, and we all know what it has evolved into now…But one thing is for sure, the way railroads were able to serve the needs of this country during the 4 years of WWII…was one of railroads finest hours…!!
wtdeb, I could not agree with you more. The potential for profit has never been better for railroads. With the updated computer systems and the improvments to infrustucture that have taken place over the years, opportunity to make a real dent into the trucking industry is there. The big question: Do Ralroads Have The Right Managment In Place To Exploit The Advantages They Have Over Trucking.
TIM A
Not so sure the “art” of railroading is in it’s heyday, so much as the technology available to manage a railroad is.
The basics of moving freight by train is still the same as it was a century ago.
The steel wheel on steel rail was one of those lucky inventions that came along at just the precise time to alter the world, and just like powered flight, the basic principal remains the same, no matter if its a steam or diesel locomotive, or a Biplane or 747.
The efficency is already there, even with the crews cut to a bare minimun.
We do our job, and do it better than we have in a long time, with less people.
What has, and will continue to make a big difference is how we gather and process the information needed to make good business decisions, and weather we are willing to change the culture of railroad managment to adapt to this improvement in technology.
RCLs wont make that big a impact towards profit, I know, with a engineer and a switchman, I can out switch any RCL operator, and earn my railroad more money, even though the carrier is paying three employees, instead of one, due to the sheer volume of cars I can move in a shift.
But all of that means nothing, and does no good, if we cant meet the business expectations of our customers.
And to do that, we have to get the business, and then service the customer in a manner that profits both the railroad, the shippers, and the railroader.
We have to do away with the dual cultures involved with railroading, the us(labor) versus them(management) style that currently influnces every business decision we make.
Without a mutually benifical contract, that ties the profit of the railroad into the productivity of the T&E employees, and shares the profit with them also, along with allowing the employees to participate in the decision making process, we are stuck where we currently are, a industry with hugh growth pontential, choking on our inability to change our thinking and de
I have to agree with Ironhorseman.
Using RR’s on Vancouver Island as an example. In the 1920’s and 30’s there were 3 common carriers and a hell of a lot of industrial railroads on the island. Canada’s two big railroads each had operations on the island, constantly competeing with each other. Canadian Pacific bought the E&N Railway in 1905, expanded it to its current size(Victoria-Parksville-Port Alberni and Parksville-Courtenay) and operated the E&N Division like their mainline on the mainland, Canadian Naitonal also had its own operation on the island.
Come 1990, only 1 logging railroad remains, CP has started marketting it’s truck lines instead of the E&N, which falls into disrepair(trackage worse than Rock Island trackage). RDC’s that replaced the standard passenger equipment decades before can’t even go a day without breaking down, and often run completely empty. Freight traffic dropped from 40,000(in 1925) car loads a year to 7,500 because CP wants to abandon the E&N and uses several low-down, down right evil tactics to scare off customers. Canadian National has abandoned it’s entire operation(all 100 miles of it). The CNR hauled only 70 cars a year in its last few years of operations, that’s one 5 car train a month.
The 3rd common carier shut down in the 1940’s.
Come 2002, the E&N has been spun off as a short line, Rail America(due to restrictions placed on them by CP in the lease agreement) cannot go after new business and is forced to shut the railroad down. They later change their minds and continue to operate the money-loosing operation, now only handling 1,000 cars a year to three remaining customers on a 181 mile network. The Parksville-Port Alberni portion of the mainline has been closed down due to the loss of the largest customer.
I’m with you on your comments Joe and Ironhorsemen…both valid arguments. But could I respecfully add that I "like"what edblsard said also as a real and valid “problem” with todays Railroaders…“being adolescent…both in suits and coveralls…” THAT right there is a BIG problem today. Egos and attitudes that WILL NOT QUIT for the love of the Industry or for the protection of their Family and their main source of INCOME! I realize one is trying to PROTECT his job or the job of his fellow workers by his “inactivity” and/or negative attitude…and the other is trying to protect his job and his millions in stock options by playing the tough-guy with the “lowly” blue collar underlings. But wouldn’t it be nice if they would give the engineers and conductors some incentives and benefits of being MORE PRODUCTIVE …ie MONEY?! or TIME OFF with PAY?! That would take railroading into the 21st century!! The potential is there and waiting for the Railroads to take back!
Nope, its was better back in the day…simply because of the VARIETY of rolling stock, rail lines and locomotives.
today we have nearly identical locos pulling nearly identical trains and with merger mania I got my choise of 5 mainlines to view from …Ohhh
excuse me if I DONT get up out of my seat and jump for joy…
I’d say the hey days were the 19-aughts. Rail miles near the all time peak. The last of the mainline mileage was just being finished. No competition from any mode to speak of. Canals and round-the-horn shipping pretty much beaten for all commodities. So much profit they had to either reinvest it or give it to the gov’t. Big moderization projects underway. Major passenger terminals. Route realignments. One in ten US workers worked for a RR.
there was a time were 95% of intercity cargo was moved by train, there was a time when the largest and most powerful company in the world was named the PRR. There was a time when every school and market place had a poster of powerful engine pulling a long string of cars. In the golden and heyday for railroads, they were the nation, everybody knew them from schoolboys to the president, now under half of our cargo is moved by train and to most the railroad is nothing more than a child’s toy. We are far from the the golden era or heyday, just because the railroads can pull more with less doesn’t mean this is the best time for them. At one point the president of the PRR was called the 51st sentator in Washington, now Washington doesn’t know what a railroad is…
“The true history of the United States is the history of transportation … in which the names of railroad presidents are more significant than those of Presidents of the United States”. – Philip Guedalla, The Hundred Years, 1937.
Guedella thought that was the period 1870-1920.
vvtdeb , I don’t know where you live, but here in Iowa, they heyday was definitly the 50s-60s. True, I do love the mix of Shortlines and Regionals, But there is so much abandoned trackage, most of it is CGW and CRI&P. The CNW-CGW merger yielded mixed results, and because of that, CNW ended up abandoning all of the lines from Oelwein (iowa) except for one. Now the Iowa Northern brings 1-3 trains a week to Oelwein since Transco (freight car rebuilder) uses the ex-CGW yard. Back in the 1960s there were 19 trains a day that went thru / arrived / departed Oelwein. Yeah, today is definitly the heyday.
We feel the railroads are headed to a NEW heyday…and we are proud to take a lead in that.
I will be running the albany facility…
Bill Collins
Hmmmm…It didn’t post the link…
www.railexusa.com
We are starting a new cross country perishable train from WA state to Albany NY
B
…In a nutshell…my opinion of the railroad heyday is in the war effort of WWII.
I’m not quoting tonnage, miles of trackage…no superlatives as such, just the importance the railroads were in transportation of ALL kinds for the war effort. They used everything that had flanged wheels and then some…
No Railroads…We would not have been successful as quick as we were or maybe even worse than that…Who knows.
Watching at any place on Pennsy’s 4 track main it was common to witness several trains at once passing that point.
The B&O branch near my home…{S&C}, was so busy hauling coal for the war effort it was almost constant traffic…doubles and pushers {steamers}, doing the job gathering the coal from the thousands of mines in the valleys and making them into trains and heading it to market…24 / 7…to power the factories in the war effot.
So you can see where my vote is. Again just my [2c].
yay no more double posts!
heyday is gone and said. CNW, SP, BN, ATSF, DRGW, NH, CR, RI, WC, Milw Rd, DMIR, all dead. it’s all UP, UP, UP, BNSF, CN, CN, UP, CN, CSX, CP, CN, CN, UP, UP, NS, shortlines now. these damn class 1s are getting too big and ridiculous. some senator needs to break them up in a legislature or something…
What a doubled up thread… Every post in this thread is double posted…and in fact the thread is double listed in the index.
People here seem to forget that the 1950’s was the last time the railroads were able to operate in a non-competitive climate. This permitted them to charge whatever they thought the market would bear for their services. The 1950’s saw the introduction of the jet passenger plane and construction of the interstate highway system (initiated by President Eisenhower). Both of these systems currently compete with the railroads with the aid of taxpayer dollars. State and Federal legislatures has seen fit to fund Amtrack and local transportation authorities only because we have run out of room to build more highways and airports along with lacking adequate money to maintain the existing infrastructures.
By the 1950’s the railroads were not in anything like a non-competitive climate, and the poor financial results of that era confirm it. Passenger counts went in a nosedive during that decade, and trucks had already been siphoning off a lot of high-rated traffic. Note that by the end of that decade, plenty of major carriers (especially in the East) were approaching insolvency. What followed in the 1960’s and 1970’s didn’t come to happen overnight. Read up on the years of over-regulation and mis-direction leading up to the Penn Central debacle.
In terms of the beauty of the passenger trains, and the fascination of the steam-to-diesel era, it was a heyday. In terms of business success, it was anything but. Today the rails have been moving freight and making money (except UP!) like never before.
I think it is telling of what each poster views as setting the criteria for what defines “heyday” as more interesting or definitive than any accounting of a objective benchmark. It’s a completely subjective point of reference. There is no doubt that the industry is enjoying a profitable resurgance. On the other hand, the roads are not as emeshed in either the daily life of folks, nor are carrying the huge variety of goods they once did, nor is popular culture inevitably interlocked with their presence. The romantic view of the brave engineer, the ballads extolling their virtues, the moving geography lessons of the rolling freight, the wave of hands from a caboose, the gateman, the porters, the vigilent towermen, the volcanic clouds of smoke and lonesome whistles…all long dead footnotes to a bygone era, replaced by whitebread corportaions with nonsensical corporate monikers, a small variety of variation of motive power…frankly, to me, and again this is subjective…it’s pretty uninvolving. Once in a while a quirky story or an interesting issue pops up to post on but roads themselves are a pretty monolitic presence unless you are into business or technology, it’s pretty slim pickins.