The Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad, Linking North & South
The Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad was not a large system, connecting only Washington, D.C. and Richmond, Virginia, a distance of roughly 113 miles. However, its strategic location allowed it to connect with virtually every major northeastern and southeastern railroad, which made the RF&P very successful.
The Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad was chartered in February of 1834 (just a few years after the chartering of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, our nation’s first common-carrier system) to connect the City of Richmond with the Potomac River. Within eight years the railroad had completed its main line where it reached Quantico, just north of Fredericksburg. Interestingly, the rest of the system between Quantico and Washington was made up by no less than three separate systems, the Alexandria and Washington Railway (which connected Washington, D.C. and Alexandria); the Alexandria and Fredericksburg Railway (which connected Alexandria and Fredericksburg); and the little two-mile Potomac Railroad, which connected the A&F with the RF&P at Quantico. In 1901 the Richmond-Washington Company was created as a holding company for the RF&P and Washington Southern Railway (which was created by the merger of the A&F and A&W), which was directly controlled by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad, Southern Railway, Atlantic Coast Line, Seaboard Air Line, and Chesapeake & Ohio Railway. While the RF&P had a few branch lines extending to Fort Belvoir and Sealston, Virginia it was essentially a linear bridge route serving its six owning railroads.  How the Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad came under the ownership of CSX is simply the result of mergers. CSX Transportation, the operating railroad of CSX Corporation, was created in 1987 through the merger of Chessie System and Seaboard System. Chessie and Seaboard came about partly through the mergers of the B&O, C&O, ACL, and SAL. So, once CSX had two-thirds ownership of the RF&P by the late 1980s Norfolk Southern Railway and Conrail (successor to the Pennsylvania) eventually sold their ownership in the railroad to CSX (NS did not even use the RF&P by this time), which merged it into its system in 1991. While the future of CSXT is as much of a guess to anyone as its past has already been, many in the industry and those who study it see two mega-railroads evolve with CSX merging with one of the western railroads (it has been studied that BNSF Railway) and Union Pacific likely joining with Norfolk Southern although only the future will tell how it all plays out. CSXT is often criticized for its lack of vision and its practice of habitually abandoning rail lines simply because they do not meet a particular profit margin.
Whatever happens with CSX Transportation one thing is certain; it is a railroad rich in history, which stretches from the Northeast to the Southeast, and points west to Chicago and New Orleans. Perhaps one day, before the merger movement begins again CSXT will find its true identity and direction with an efficient and effective management team. For a gallery of photos highlighting the RF&P please click here. Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad All-Time Locomotive Rosters
For more on the fallen flag railroads like the RF&P consider one (or all) of Mike Schafer's Classic American Railroads books (listed below is the first in the series). He has published three thus far covering virtually all of the most well known fallen flags. I have all three in my collection and highly recommend them, the photography is excellent along with learning a general history of each railroad. If you're interested in perhaps purchasing one of these books please visit The Railroad Diamond by clicking the tab in the menu to your left marked "TRD Store".
|
