Some railroad trivia
1961: Missouri Pacific acquires the rail industry’s first solid-state computer, an IBM 7070. Railroads will become one of the earliest major users of computer technology.
1968: Southern Pacific acquires the rail industry’s first locomotive engineer training simulator.
1970: In June, the giant Penn Central declares bankruptcy. At the time, it was the biggest corporate bankruptcy in U.S. history. I remember that day. It precipitated the bankruptcy of many other railroads in the NE US, including the Lehigh Valley, Erie Lackawanna, Reading, Central of New Jersey, Lehigh and Hudson River and the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penn_Central_Transportation_Company#Bankruptcy
The Penn Central Transportation Company was created in 1968 via a merger between the Pennsylvania and New York Central railroads. The Pennsylvania Railroad dated back to 1846, and the New York Central railroad dated back to 1853.
1976: The Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act creates the Consolidated Rail Corp. (Conrail) from six bankrupt Northeast railroads. The legislation also includes regulatory reforms that are supposed to make the rail regulatory system more responsive to changed circumstances.
1977: The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (CMStP&P), aka the "Milwaukee Road" (reporting mark MILW) filed for its third bankruptcy in 42 years on December 19. It suffered from poor management for about 7+ decades. Operations ended west of
Miles City, Montana on February 29, 1980. Ultimately, lines were abandoned and the surviving railroad broken up and sold to Soo Line (a subsidiary of CP), BN (now BNSF), and other smaller railroads.
The BN was formed in 1970 from the merger of Great Northern; Norther Pacific; Chicago, Burlington & Quincy (CBQ) and Seattle, Portland & Spokane (SPS)
The Milwaukee Road secured concessions from the BN merger, which were intended to preserve competition in the Norther States and Pacific Northwest. However, MILW failed to ensure the concessions were met, and the ICC failed to enforce, in addition to having a rundown physical plant.
1980: Congress passes the
Staggers Rail Act, reducing the Interstate Commerce Commission’s regulatory authority over railroads and sparking competition that stimulates advances in technology and a restructuring of the industry, including creation of hundreds of new shortline and regional railroads using rail lines spun off from larger railroads.
During the 1980s, the railroad industry began a merger trend that now sees essentially 7 class I freight railroads: BNSF and UP in the west, CP, CN and KCS in the middle and north, and CSX and NS in the east.
1996: After 108 years, the Interstate Commerce Commission goes out of existence and is replaced by the Surface Transportation Board, which assumes responsibility for remaining regulation of rail rates and services.
2008: Coal again becomes the top source of U.S. rail industry revenue, overtaking intermodal (which had taken over the top spot in 2003). Class I railroads originate a record 879 million tons of coal.
https://www.aar.org/chronology-of-americas-freight-railroads/
In 2020, coal shipments have dropped about 17% from 2019 levels and about 30% from 2018 levels.
