Conrail (Railroad): Map, Logo, Roster, History

Last revised: September 17, 2026

The Consolidated Rail Corporation—Conrail, mark CR—was the federal answer to the Northeastern freight collapse of the 1970s. Pennsylvania incorporated the company on February 10, 1976. Operations began at 12:01 a.m. on April 1, 1976, with about 19,000 route-miles taken from Penn Central, Erie Lackawanna, the Reading, the Lehigh Valley, the Central Railroad of New Jersey, the Lehigh & Hudson River, and related bits. It lost money like Penn Central at first. L. Stanley Crane took the helm on January 1, 1981. The railroad was in the black by year-end. The government sold its stake on March 26, 1987. CSX and Norfolk Southern split the Class I on June 1, 1999. Diesels that wore CR numbers are the Conrail diesel roster. This page is the company.

Recently repainted Conrail SD40 6351 grinding upgrade with westbound vans on Horseshoe Curve with four tracks in service

Recently repainted Conrail SD40 #6351 (built as Pennsylvania #6098) grinds upgrade with westbound vans on Horseshoe Curve. All four tracks were still in service. Warren Calloway photo.

On this page: At a glance · Penn Central and the cascade · 3R Act and the Railway Association · Erie Lackawanna in · April 1, 1976 · Big Blue · GG1s and the wire · Commuter and NERSA · Crane, Staggers, 1981 · March 26, 1987 · CSX, Norfolk Southern, June 1, 1999 · What remains

At a glance

The Conrail logo. Author’s work. Tony Palladino at Siegel & Gale; steel wheels on steel rails, nicknamed the can-opener. Unveiled May 30, 1976.

Item	Detail
What it was	Consolidated Rail Corporation. Federal freight railroad assembled from Northeastern bankruptcies. Mark CR
Headquarters	Six Penn Center Plaza, Philadelphia (conveyance). Later 2001 Market Street
Incorporated	Pennsylvania February 10, 1976
Operations	April 1, 1976, 12:01 a.m.–June 1, 1999
3R Act	Regional Rail Reorganization Act, signed January 2, 1974. Created the United States Railway Association
4R Act	Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act, signed February 5, 1976. Approved the Final System Plan
Route-miles	About 19,000 (1976). 10,826 (1998)
States / provinces	Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky (Louisville), Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri (St. Louis); Ontario and Quebec
Gauge	4 ft 8½ in
Paint	Conrail blue, white lettering and can-opener. First locomotive, GP40 3091, Collinwood, May 20, 1976
First profit	Year-end 1981, under L. Stanley Crane (from January 1)
IPO	March 26, 1987. Government stake about $1.65 billion; about $1.9 billion with cash to the Treasury
End of the Class I	CSX and Norfolk Southern split, June 1, 1999. Conrail Shared Assets remains as a switching company
Roster	Conrail diesel roster

Dates align with the 1970s decade page and the Staggers page. 19,000 miles is the Official Guide-era start plant. Information compiled September 17, 2026.

Penn Central and the cascade

Penn Central had been created on February 1, 1968, from the Pennsylvania and the New York Central. The New Haven came in January 1, 1969. The computers did not talk. Classification clerks lost cars. Slow orders multiplied. Cash ran out at more than a million dollars a day. The board voted to file under Section 77 on June 21, 1970. That filing is the Penn Central encyclopedia. What this page owns is what the filing did to everyone else.

Boston & Maine had already filed, on March 12, 1970. Lehigh Valley followed. The Reading filed November 23, 1971. Jersey Central was already in its last bankruptcy, from March 22, 1967. Lehigh & Hudson River went in. Hurricane Agnes in June 1972 put Erie Lackawanna into court on June 26. By 1973 more than half the Northeastern rail network was in receivership. The decade frame is the 1970s.

Judge John P. Fullam sat on Penn Central. Trustees headed by Jervis Langdon, Jr.—once president of the Baltimore & Ohio—first thought a traditional reorganization might work. They hired William H. Moore from the Southern. He did not last. Langdon took the presidency himself in January 1973 and told Fullam the estate could not be reorganized without federal help. The ICC would not let the railroad abandon branches that handled a handful of cars a year, or raise rates on traffic that lost money. Amtrak took the intercity trains on May 1, 1971. Commuter trains stayed. Crew consist stayed at five men. Unions walked out briefly on February 7, 1973. Congress said it would act.

3R Act and the Railway Association

The Regional Rail Reorganization Act—the 3R Act—was signed by President Nixon on January 2, 1974. It created the United States Railway Association (not the 1918 USRA) inside the Department of Transportation to draw a Final System Plan, and a Rail Services Planning Office to watch the Association. The railroad itself would be Conrail. Jim McClellan, who had helped stand up Amtrak, was among the planners. The first Preliminary System Plan took Penn Central, Reading, Lehigh & Hudson River, Jersey Central, Lehigh Valley, and the Ann Arbor. Erie Lackawanna was left out on purpose: a solvent EL would have been competition into Chicago.

The Poughkeepsie Bridge burned on May 8, 1974. Maybrook died. New England gateway traffic that had used EL was gone. EL’s trustees first said they could reorganize, then asked for inclusion on January 9, 1975.

Erie Lackawanna in

EL’s request threw the plan. One idea was MARC, a Mid-Atlantic Railroad from CNJ, Reading, Lehigh Valley, and L&HR, working with EL against Conrail. Washington lost interest in the cost. Another was Three Systems East: Norfolk & Western would take EL, Chessie System the Reading and Jersey Central to the Port of New York. N&W backed away. Chessie, under Hays T. Watkins, was offered EL in July 1975—Two Systems East. Chessie and EL’s unions could not agree. EL went into Conrail. The double-track Chicago main west of Ohio was mothballed in favor of the old Pennsylvania and Central. The Friendly Service Route in the Midwest is gone.

April 1, 1976

The Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act—the 4R Act—was signed by President Ford on February 5, 1976. It approved the Final System Plan, created Conrail as the operating company, and began to loosen ICC rate control. Pennsylvania papers were filed February 10. Conveyance was 12:01 a.m. on April 1. Edward G. Jordan of the USRA was the first chairman. Richard D. Spence, from Southern Pacific, was president.

Penn Central had been about 20,500 miles. CNJ about 700, Reading about 1,300, Lehigh Valley about 1,250, L&HR 86, EL about 3,000. Combined, more than 26,800. McClellan had argued that more than 15,575 miles needed cutting at once, EL aside. Langdon had said nearly half of Penn Central should go; 11,000 miles made 80 percent of the freight. At start Conrail kept about 19,000, including light-density lines states would try to save. The Delaware & Hudson stayed out as a competitor, with directed equipment from Lehigh Valley and Reading. Pittsburgh & Lake Erie stayed independent. Ann Arbor went to Michigan. Miles kept coming off through the 1990s. By 1998 the plant was 10,826.

An official 1978 Conrail system map.

Official 1986 Conrail system map by Rand McNally and Company

An official 1986 Conrail system map by Rand McNally & Company.

An official 1993 Conrail system map.

Big Blue

Nothing magical happened on April 1. The railroad still lost about a million dollars a day. Locomotives ran in Penn Central black, Erie maroon, Reading green, Jersey Central red, Lehigh Valley yellow, and whatever stencil the shops had time for. Siegel & Gale got the identity. Tony Palladino drew wheels on rails—the can-opener. Final art April 28, 1976; rolling stock unveiled May 30. Conrail blue, white lettering. Boxcars red oxide; covered hoppers gray. The first locomotive in dress blues was GP40 3091, still carrying its New York Central number, out of Collinwood on May 20. Trains ran John C. Benson’s photograph that August. The railroad hoped to have 170 of some 5,000 locomotives in blue by year-end. Big Blue is what stuck.

GG1s and the wire

Conrail GG-1 4800 Old Rivets in Bicentennial livery at Leaman Place Pennsylvania ahead of an Amtrak special summer 1976

Conrail GG-1 #4800—Old Rivets, the original GG-1—in Bicentennial paint at Leaman Place, Pennsylvania, interchange with the Strasburg, ahead of an Amtrak special, summer 1976. Jerry Custer photo.

Penn Central left Conrail the Pennsylvania electrification: New York–Washington and the freight wires to Harrisburg. GG1s still handled passenger and some freight. 4800 wore red, white, and blue in 1976, then Conrail blue. Amtrak took corridor passenger motors; Conrail kept freight electrics, including former Virginian/New Haven E-33s, into the late 1970s. NJ Transit bought thirteen GG1s on July 1, 1980. The last revenue GG1 was NJ Transit 4879, train 3323 out of Penn Station, October 28, 1983. That story is the GG1 page. Diesels that ran under the wire, including New Haven FL9s on Metro-North, are on the diesel roster.

Conrail GG-1 4800 Old Rivets in Bicentennial livery at the former Pennsylvania shops in Wilmington Delaware in 1976

Conrail GG-1 #4800, Old Rivets, in Bicentennial livery at the former Pennsylvania shops, Wilmington, Delaware, 1976. Photographer unknown.

A freshly repainted Conrail E-33, #4608, at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, May 29, 1977. Built as Virginian EL-C #139, then Norfolk & Western #239, New Haven #308, Penn Central #4608. Mark Saxon photo.

Commuter and NERSA

Conrail inherited the commuter trains Penn Central, EL, Reading, and CNJ had not been able to drop. MBTA took Massachusetts in March 1977. Cleveland–Youngstown EL service ended in 1977. The Valparaiso Local out of Chicago Union Station went to Amtrak in 1979. New York and Philadelphia stayed longest. The Northeast Rail Service Act, signed August 13, 1981, let Conrail shed commuter operations to state agencies. NJ Transit, SEPTA, Metro-North, and the rest took the trains. Freight was the point.

Conrail GP9 7508 and GP7 5959 leading the Valparaiso Local out of Chicago Union Station July 3 1978

Conrail GP9 #7508 and GP7 #5959 lead the Valparaiso Local out of Chicago Union Station, July 3, 1978. Marty Bernard photo. Amtrak took the train in 1979.

Crane, Staggers, 1981

USRA planners had expected red ink into 1990. John Kneiling said so in Trains, September 1975. By 1980 there was still no bottom. The Staggers Rail Act, signed October 14, 1980, gave the industry contract rates and a way to abandon. Conrail still had too many miles and too many people. L. Stanley Crane retired from the Southern and took Conrail on January 1, 1981. He cut another 4,400 miles in two years and lost about 1 percent of the traffic. CTC went in. He showed the unions the books. They gave back wage increases and layoff pay worth about $200 million. When profits came, some officers wanted to keep the money. Crane ordered it returned. Year-end 1981 was the first profit since the early Penn Central months of 1968.

Conrail business train in Brunswick green with gold lettering powered by E8As at Pittsburgh March 19 1997

The office-car special wore Brunswick green and gold, powered by E8As. Pittsburgh, March 19, 1997. Wade Massie photo.

March 26, 1987

Norfolk Southern tried to buy Conrail from the government in the mid-1980s and withdrew in August 1986. The Conrail Privatization Act that October authorized a public offering. On March 26, 1987, the government sold its 85 percent at $28 a share. The stake brought about $1.65 billion; with Conrail cash to the Treasury, about $1.9 billion. It was then the largest U.S. initial public offering. The railroad was a private Class I again, ticker CRR, still headquartered in Philadelphia, still blue.

CSX, Norfolk Southern, June 1, 1999

Two mains New York–Chicago made Conrail the Eastern intermodal conveyor. Traffic and the stock attracted the neighbors a second time. CSX announced a purchase in 1996. Norfolk Southern fought it. The two settled: CSX about 42 percent, mostly former New York Central; Norfolk Southern about 58 percent, mostly former Pennsylvania. The Surface Transportation Board approved the split. Conveyance was June 1, 1999. The Class I ended. CSX and NS encyclopedias stay on their pages.

What remains

Conrail Shared Assets Operations is the switching company CSX and Norfolk Southern still own jointly: North Jersey, South Jersey/Philadelphia, and Detroit. The can-opener is on museum locomotives and on Norfolk Southern heritage unit 8098. The Pennsylvania and Central spines are CSX and NS. The holding company of February 10, 1976, is not a Class I.

Sources

Loving, Rush, Jr. The Men Who Loved Trains: The Story of Men Who Battled Greed to Save an Ailing Industry. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006. PC trustees; Crane; labor; IPO politics
Grant, H. Roger. Erie Lackawanna: Death Of An American Railroad, 1938–1992. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994. EL inclusion January 9, 1975
Consolidated Rail Corporation. Company history. Incorporated February 10, 1976; operations April 1, 1976; Staggers; IPO
Trains Magazine, August 1976. First Conrail blue locomotive, GP40 3091, Collinwood May 20, 1976
Kneiling, John. “Kneiling vs. USRA.” Trains, September 1975. Negative cash flow into 1990
Goldman Sachs. Historic Conrail IPO, March 26, 1987. $28 per share; about $1.65 billion
Logopedia / Siegel & Gale identity notes. Tony Palladino can-opener; unveiled May 30, 1976
American-Rails.com: 1970s decade (3R January 2, 1974; 4R February 5, 1976; Conrail April 1, 1976); Staggers; Penn Central; GG1