I just finished a book by Fred Frailey,written in 1991. Frailey seems to know what he’s talking about, as far as railroad business goes. In the book, Rolling Thunder, he speaks highly of SP-“the railroad we should all watch in the 1990’s”. Did he miss the boat on this? Hinsight is always 20/20 vision, but weren’t SP’s weaknesses fairly visable in 1991?
SP’s problems were known about by 1991. Remember Mark Hemphill’s article in the March 2005 issue of Trains said that SP limped out of the 1970s. After limping for at least 11 years, I would think it would be noticeable. Did he say why to watch SP? Implosions can be specatular. Did Frailey think that increasing traffic on the Sunset Route and the RGI buyout would save SP? Did he like SP’s new paint scheme?
Reader’s Digest version:Frailey seems to say, that SP was heading for something big, because it: bought and rebuilt RI’s Tucumcari-KC line,got trackage rights on UP from KC to St. Louis,and got bought out by Rio Grande/Philip Anschutz. He said SP went everywhere ATSF did, and other places as well. “The property is in good shape”. (?)…and has $98 million of Anschutz’s money invested. To be fair, he asks it sort of as a question: will it succeed, or not? “But my hunch is that the mission can succeed”.
If Anschutz had invested another $98 million to increase capacity on the Sunset Route, and the yards in Houston, SP may have headed to something big besides the merger into UP.
Mark Hemphill’s article was a great one. What an amazing turn of events for SP during the 60’s.
ed
Surely, Fred Frailey was aware, in 1991, of what the SP had been through in the 60’s. What cause did he have to be optimistic about SP’s future?
I have always heard SP’s property and equipment were in sad shape by the 1990s and SP was deferring maintenance. Frailey seems to be correct except for that. Unfortunately for SP, it’s poor condition rendered all of those assets moot.