The railroads didn't only run on the rails but also created intercity bus line, motor carrier, airline and marine subsidiaries, to better serve customers and investors alike. In some instances they were forced to terminate some of these services due to anti-trust laws. Much more liberal was Canada where Canadian Pacific was permitted to "Span the World!" (even hotels!) Other Canadian railways followed suit, Canadian National and Ontairo Northland, for example.
In the US, didn't Jim Hill's Great Northern build and operate the hotel resort that served Glacier National Park? Other than the excellent book by the late Duane Kaufman on Rio Grande Motor Way (bus and truck) have their been any other publications on the subject of non-rail subsidiaries operated by America's railroads?
It's fairly well known that Greyhound is the outgrowth of railroad-owned bus subsidiaries. Some of the smaller operators in the Trailways system developed out of interurbans that changed from rail to bus. North Central Airlines (merged into Republic, then Northwest, now Delta) was originally Wisconsin Central and was owned by the original Wisconsin Central Railroad. Northeast Airlines was established by the B&M.
Railroad-owned resorts include Sun Valley (UP) and the Greenbrier (C&O). There may be others.
The CN, as well as the CP, built hotels--and the Hotel Vancouver was owned by both roads.
Johnny
And don't forget CP Airlines!
Trinity River Bottoms BoomerIn the US, didn't Jim Hill's Great Northern build and operate the hotel resort that served Glacier National Park?
Actually, the Great Northern built four hotels, three in Montana and one in Alberta, on the Canadian side of the Park. The US hotels were the Glacier Park Lodge, Many Glacier Hotel, and the Lake McDonald Lodge. The Canadian hotel, in Waterton National Park, was the Price of Wales Hotel.
I have always felt that it is not possible to take a bad looking picture of that place. Sadly, until the last of its many renovations over the years, the actual experience of staying there never lived up to the expectations generated by the photos, for a variety of reasons I won't go into here. In the late nineties or early 2000's both VW and Buick shot commercials on the hotel grounds. It was the buzz generated by the Buick commercial that created the right incentive for its most recent renovation. Here is a link to a picture of the hotel:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_of_Wales_Hotel
NorthWestAnd don't forget CP Airlines!
Trans Canada Airlines, now known as Air Canada, was created by the government and set up as a subsidiary of Canadian National Railways in the 1930's. It wasn't separated from the CNR until the sixties, I think. Canadian Pacific Airlines was set up by buying several existing small bush airlines, as a response to TCA a year or so later.
In order for the government to convince Canadians that having an airline during the depression was a good idea, they came up with a pretty novel move. Prisoners, then as now, had to occasionally be moved from one Federal prison to another. In what might be the original Con-Air, they flew them on TCA. These prisoners were part of TCA's passenger revenue, and the actual cost was buried in a line item in the Justice Department budget!
CN and Air Canada were privatized at separate times, and Air Canada bought out CP Airlines.
Bruce
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
The question had to do with books about non-rail subsidiaries.
Though it owned a fleet of "express reefers," The Railway Express Agency was largely a trucking outfit, which I think, was a jointly owned (by the railroads) trucking delivery service. A book exists.
Not a book that I know of, but a lot of beer went south from the Bay Area in trailers carried on the Zipper, which ran as a 1st class schedule. The trailers were marked for PIE, SP's trucking subsidiary, Pacific Intermountain Express. Stein photo's, a TRAINS article, the fifties?....
And late 1800's, early 1900's SP had a ship fleet running the Gulf to Atlantic ports; it was bought or otherwise acquired, not originated by SP (or whatever the corporate identity was then.)
The Fred Harvey Hotels were closely associated with the Santa Fe. The MILW had the Gallatin Gateway Inn. The Ulster & Delaware and the Grand Hotel had the same owners. I believe Flagler built hotels for the FEC.
The BAR had a bus subsidiary
In communications, SPRINT started out as Southern Pacific Railroad Internal Networking Telephony.
For marine subsidiaries (and US rail/marine interconnection) I highly recommend Where Rails Meet the Sea by Michael Krieger (Metro Books)
Not sure if this fits the criterion, but the Public Service company in New Jersey once operated Public Service Co-ordinated Transport, which comprised buses, trolleys, and in the city of Newark a subway system. Of the "steel wheel on steel rail" portions only the subway survives today as part of NJ Transit. The old bus lines became NJ Transit operations as well.
SP had their long distance coal slurry pipeline in Arizona.
Public service was simply typical of 99% of North Americas street railways, nearly all of which had bus lines or separate bus subsidiaries at one time. Before government operation became normal, one could find so-and-so street railway as the company name for many pure bus operations after wwII. Indana Railroad kept its name as an all bus system! Until merged into Trailways.
What was unique about Public Service was its use of "All-Service Vehicles," the earliest bus application of dual-mode, gas-and-trolley-bus.
Right you are on the All-Service Vehicles" Dave! For the rest of you out there, Public Service's ASV's ran under trolley wire, then off gasolene-powered generators where trolley wire's weren't available.
Even earlier, the French St. Chamond tank of World War One vintage utilised a gasolene-powered generator to turn electric motors which turned the tracks. It was a lot easier than building a complicated mechanical transmission.
So there's nothing really new about hybrid vehicles, is there?
Oh, as far as marine subsidiarys are concerned, do the tugboat fleets operated by the CNJ, NYC, Pennsy, Lehigh Valley, Erie, and Lackawanna railroads, among others, count?
No one has yet mentioned the Delaware and Hudson Canal company's gradual transition to a railroad.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
And car ferries, including the Sacramento Northern's Ramon. But now there is an interurban that may never have had a bus subsidiary. Or did they?
While not exactly classic in their RR owned days, Container ship line Sealand Transportation (now mostly defunct) was a CSX subsidiary, Overnite transportation, an LTL motor carrier that is now part of UPS (and no longer branded Overnite) was owned by Union Pacific, and North American Van lines was once owned by Norfolk southern.
"I Often Dream of Trains"-From the Album of the Same Name by Robyn Hitchcock
The Hotel Pennsylvania is probably the first building I ever saw in New York, upon exiting through the front door of Penn Station in 1955, because I scan a scene from left to right. I remember looking up! of course.
Excerpt from Standard Corporation Service (1917)
The "Record & Guide," New York, Aug. 11, 1917, stated that the Prudential Insurance Co. of America had loaned to the Pennsylvania Terminal Real Estate Co. for five years at 5% $8,000.000 on the building now in course of construction, to be known as the Hotel Pennsylvania, which will occupy the entire block front on the east side of Seventh Ave., between 32d and 33d Streets, New York City, opposite the Pennsylvania Station. The Pennsylvania R. R. owns all the $3,000,000 capital stock of the Terminal Real Estate Co.
Excerpt from The Architectural Review (1919)
The sub-basement floor plan takes in the space which was partly pre-empted by the Pennsylvania Railroad and Long Island Railroad tunnels, which find their way into 32nd and 33d Streets at this level. There is an underground passage to the Pennsylvania Station at this level, reached from the hotel by a pair of elevators running to the main lobby, three floors above....
In designing the hotel for the same owners, the architects have studied to relate the two structures in scale and expression. Attention is called to the setting-back from the regular city building lines of both the station and the hotel to produce the effect of a plaza....
In order to relate the exterior of the building with the Pennsylvania Station opposite, the lower stories to a height equal to that of the station have been treated as a solid base faced with Indiana limestone and given a monumental character by an order of Roman Ionic pilasters. The walls between the pilasters are lightly rusticated and there is a story of ashlar above. The main entrance in the center of the Seventh Avenue facade is emphasized by a portico with six Ionic columns.
Excerpt from Electrical World (1919)
Since service is the outstanding requirement of a hotel, one of the fundamental conditions laid down by the consulting engineer for the hotel was that a failure of the electric service must be practically impossible, and this end was attained by providing two independent sources of supply; namely, from the main power station of the Pennsylvania Railroad at Long Island City and from a generator in the hotel operated by steam purchased from the Pennsylvania Terminal. The first source can take care of all the requirements of the hotel, while the generator is able to provide enough energy for emergency lighting and power purposes....
Electricity from the Long Island City plant is received in the form of 11,000-volt, 60-cycle, three-phase alternating energy through a tunnel which terminates at a transformer room in the sub-basement of the hotel.
Anyone remember that hotel's phone number made famous by Glenn Miller?
OK, here it is: "PEnnsylvania 6-5000!"
I thought that was "TRansylvania 6-5000".
Excerpt from Be My Guest by Conrad Hilton (1957)
"One did not, however, simply walk in and buy the Waldorf any more than one casually acquired the Territory of Alaska or called a real estate man and negotiated the Louisiana Purchase. She had two royal parents, both of whom had to approve any change of status. First there was the Hotel Waldorf-Astoria Corporation, organized to build the hotel, owner of the proud name and governor of her operation. Then there was the New York State Realty and Terminal Company. It was from them that the site on which the Waldorf stood was leased. This company also had advanced $10,000,000 toward the cost of the building and held a veto power over who operated the Waldorf. It was thus necessary to purchase control of the corporation and win the approval of the company as well."
New York Central 'investments' listed in 1943 annual report:
230 Park Ave. - N.Y.C. Building
247 Park Ave. - Park-Lexington Building
250 Park Ave. - Offices
270 Park Ave. - Apartments
277 Park Ave. - Apartments
290 Park Ave. - Apartments
299 Park Ave. - Park Lane Hotel
300 Park Ave. - Apartments
301-315 Park Ave. - Waldorf-Astoria Hotel
320 Park Ave. - Apartments
340-350 Park Ave. - Apartments
420 Lexington Ave. - Graybar Building
379 Madison Ave. - Offices
385 Madison Ave. - Offices
109-129 E. 42nd St. - Commodore Hotel
33-55 E. 43rd St. - Biltmore Hotel
35-59 E. 45th St. - Roosevelt Hotel
33 E. 48th Street - Chatham Hotel
115 E. 48th Street - Barclay Hotel
Phoebe Vet I thought that was "TRansylvania 6-5000".
Nah, THAT was some dopey movie!
Lots of information here and thanks but not many listings of books or periodicals on the subject. I'm sure I can surf the web til I drop but if anyone can list specific publications on the railroads non-rail subsidiaries it would be most helpful. There is a bit in Johnnie Myers book on Texas Electric regarding the TE Bus Lines set up after the interurbans quit running but I have searched in vain for additional information.
Wanswheel, I'd like to express just how amazing the photo you posted on the 30th is. The atmosphere is incredible!
I doubt that this one is published in any single publication, but the book East Broad Top, by Lee Rainey and Frank Kyper (Golden West Books, San Marino, CA, 1982) has pretty good coverage of the East Broad Top Transit Company, which was formed in 1929 in an effort to reduce passenger train losses on the East Broad Top Railroad.. Bus service was offered from Huntingdon PA to Hagerstown, MD via Mt. Union, Orbisonia, and McConnellsburg. Expansion resulted in service to Tyrone, State College, and Chambersburg at various times. The operation included a two ton truck that provided freight service between Orbisonia and McConnellsburg. Bus service was cut back to Orbisonia - Huntingdon in 1940, with the longer routes being spun off to Greyhound. The Huntingdon - Orbisonia route was taken over by Rohm Transit Company "some years later" according to Rainey and Kyper. One of the E.B.T. Transit Co.'s busses still exists, and was often present for special events when the E.B.T. tourists trains were running.
Tom
Gulf Transport Co. was a wholly owned subsidiary of the GM&O which operated both truck and bus service.
Mark
efftenxrfe Though it owned a fleet of "express reefers," The Railway Express Agency was largely a trucking outfit, which I think, was a jointly owned (by the railroads) trucking delivery service.
Though it owned a fleet of "express reefers," The Railway Express Agency was largely a trucking outfit, which I think, was a jointly owned (by the railroads) trucking delivery service.
Can't let this go uncorrected. Altho Railway Express always had trucks for last-mile, local deliveries, it was only in the last few years of its existence -- after the great wave of 1967 passenger train-offs had made its rail operations unsustainable -- that it became a "trucking outfit." Before that, it operated out of its own cars on those passenger trains, usually on the "secondary" mail haulers.
As an over-the-road trucker, REA was too late to the game, and folded about 1975.
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