Norfolk Southern Railway, The Thoroughbred Road
Today’s Norfolk Southern Railway was mostly formed out of desperation. Once the Southern and Norfolk & Western Railways realized that the Chessie System and Seaboard Coast Line Industries were seriously planning a merger they knew their railroads would be completely dwarfed and surrounded by this gargantuan new railroad. Also realizing that there were few other options of merger partners, especially after the collapse of the Northeastern rail market, after much discussion in the late 1970s they came to a merger agreement and were formally merged to form the new Norfolk Southern Railway, a division of Norfolk Southern Corporation.
The 1999 acquisition of Conrail, jointly split with CSX, was perhaps the most important and critical time in the company’s history. If CSX had been allowed to purchase Conrail outright, not only would NS have been entirely surrounded but also it could never again effectively compete with CSX, even if it was able to run a railroad much more efficiently and effectively than CSX. NS had been interested in Conrail for some time because it would add an important addition the railroad needed, direct lines to the markets of New York City and Philadelphia which Conrail had been effective in developing and exploiting by becoming a intermodal (i.e., the movement of ship containers which can be moved via over-the-road trucks as well) juggernaut moving containers between Chicago and the Northeast.
So, thus began the battle for Conrail in the mid-1990s when CSX announced its intentions of purchasing the railroad outright. Through an aggressive bidding war NS was able to not only buy into Conrail but also was able to take the most profitable routes.  In 1999 the merger split was finalized, with a division of Conrail known as Conrail Shared Assets to operate a portion of the railroad in New Jersey jointly owned between CSX and the Norfolk Southern Railway. With the merger completed NS was able to diversify its traffic base much more broadly and became known as much for its intermodal business as for its traditional coal traffic in western Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
The above map gives a family tree of the largest railroads which have made up Norfolk Southern Railway. More information about each can be found in the below links: Akron, Canton & Youngstown Railroad New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad (Nickel Plate Road) The Conrail merger at first overwhelmed both the Norfolk Southern Railway and CSX. However, NS was able to quickly stabilize itself and effectively meld Conrail into its system, much more so than CSX, which is still struggling with its half (although CSX is finally beginning to show improvements itself). For more information about the Norfolk Southern Railway please click here to visit their official website. Please Click Here To Return To The Main Class Is Section
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