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Railroading In The 1970s, Bankruptcies And Mergers

While railroading in the 1950s was becoming more efficient it unfortunately did not stem the tide of losses, which only became worse in the 1960s. The decade saw many railroads in financial trouble as well as a number of mergers. Names like the mighty Pennsylvania Railroad, New York Central, Chicago Great Western, Erie, DL&W, Seabord Air Line, Atlantic Coast Line, and others would all disappear into merger in the 1960s. Also, passenger rail services began to worsen as lines cut back on spending as folks continued to abandon trains for cars and airplanes. By 1970 only the most popular named trains like the Empire Builder and Super Chief still carried full service, including sleepers.

Railroading in the 1970s was a very hard decade for the industry. It was already off to a bad start with the creation of Penn Central in 1968, which had declared bankruptcy by June of 1970. The result of this was a ripple effect throughout the entire Northeast, as other railroads that depended on the Penn Central to ferry traffic no longer had a means to move their freight. These lines included names like Lehigh Valley Railroad, Reading Railroad, Lehigh & Hudson River Railway, Erie Lackawanna, and Delaware & Hudson Railway. It became so bad that the Penn Central was facing total shutdown if financial assistance were not located.

Realizing the severity of the situation the federal government stepped and setup the Consolidated Rail Corporation, which comprised the skeletons of several bankrupt Northeastern carriers, and began operations on April 1, 1976. With federal backing Conrail began to slowly pull out of the red ink (it took many years) and by the late 1980s was a profitable railroad after thousands of miles of access trackage was abandoned and/or upgraded.

Aside from the creation of Conrail, railroading in the 1970s saw Amtrak born as well. The early years of Amtrak were somewhat like a circus as it attempted to organize a chaotic system from the remnants of the private freight railroads' passenger operations. Relief for the railroads would finally come in the way of the National Railroad Passenger Corporation, or Amtrak, signed into law by President Richard Nixon in the way of the Rail Passenger Service Act, which began operations on May 1st, 1971.

Some railroads like the Southern Railway and Denver & Rio Grande Western opted not to include their passenger operations in with Amtrak and others like the Rock Island could not afford to turn over their operations to the carrier but for the most passenger service provided by the private railroads ended forever after 1971. With the creation of Amtrak the passenger rail network (or that which was remaining) dropped from 112,000 miles in 1957 to just 49,000.

Aside from the creation of Conrail and the classic railroad companies which disappeared into its name others would be merged out of existence in the 1970s: Chessie System would become the corporate name of the B&O, C&O and Western Maryland in 1972; the marketing name of the Family Lines system gobbled up the Seaboard Coast Line, L&N, Clinchfield and other smaller lines; and Burlington Northern was formed in 1970 from the CB&Q, Northern Pacific, Great Northern and SP&S; after a botched merger preceding by the ICC the Rock Island was liquidated in 1980. These are just some of the biggest names to disappear, many smaller lines also went extinct in the 1970s.

Railroading in the 1970s saw its intercity freight volume at near record lows of just 38.8% when in 1929 it held 75%. Also, since 1970 the railroad industry has witnessed its freight ton-mile volume more than double from its 771 billion figure. While the industry's percentage base would drop slightly in 1980, since that time it has slowly improved to over 40% today.

Railroading in the 1970s was not a good time to be in the business and many seemed to think that the industry was an outdated mode of transportation that needed to be replaced. However, with the creation of the Staggers Act and deregulation of the industry things slowly began to change. Now free to set their own rates and more open to abandon unneeded trackage railroads slowly began to recover. The mega-merger movement also continued during the 1980s as many more famous names like the Milwaukee Road, Southern Railway, Norfolk & Western Railway, Rio Grande and others all disappeared during the decade. While its been unfortunate to see these names gone forever railroads found a new role in the transportation market during the 1980s and today they play an extremely important role in moving goods and materials.

Lastly, for more reading about railroad history in general is the book The Complete Book of North American Railroading put together by several noted railroad authors such as Mike Schafer, Jim Boyd, and Steve Glischinski (the others are Kevin EuDaly, Steve Jessup, and Andrew McBride). Filled with more than 350 pages of excellent photography and information the book generally covers the industry from its earliest beginnings, through the "Golden Age," and finally to today.

Also, for more reading about the disaster that occurred with the Penn Central and the other northeast railroads, especially regarding the inside management and accounting practices of the railroading leading up to and through the disaster (and into the Conrail era) I strongly recommend The Men Who Loved Trains: The Story of Men Who Battled Greed to Save an Ailing Industry from Rush Loving, Jr. It is one of my personal favorites and Loving gives a detailed look (as he was in the middle of and lived through the disaster) at management and operations (and their fundamental problems and flaws) while also keeping things very interesting and not just a boring textbook filled with dull numbers and procedures (the book was also given high marks by the leading industry magazine, Trains from Kalmbach Publishing). The book will also give you a bit of understanding about how the current eastern road’s fate came about through failed mergers and other attempts that were unsuccessful. If you own one railroad book in your collection I would highly suggest it be this one, you won’t be disappointed! In any event, if you're interested in perhaps purchasing either (or both) of these books please visit the links below which will take you to ordering information through Amazon.com, the trusted online shopping network.

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