In the Trains Magazine forum there was a discussion about the PC Cassatt Conference and the idea of national transportation company's. Lets take this a step back, assume there never was a Penn Central and go back to c.1957 when the eastern railroads were really beginning to realize there were problems. The PRR and NYC never merged in this scenario, I am curious as to your thoughts on what would have happened?
If PRR and NYC never married? It was almost inevetable. Too many other smaller roads would have had to make pacts which would have been a paper (legal) nightmare! Besides, the concept of merger then and the concept now are different, legally and stratigically. End to end mergers were thought to be ok, but parallels were still looked at with a jaundiced eye. The EL had done it at that time and there was still a lot of observing going on. But the EL was so small in relation to either the PRR or NYC that bringing anymore into the fold would have been parallel madness. Perhaps, though, the D&H and B&M could have made sense to a degree. Barring all that, step back to pre EL and you've got the DL&W being politely escorted out of the NKP boardroom with a "no thanks" to the idea of an end to end merger as the NKP feared the DL&W debt. If PRR and NYC never married? A lot of then contemporary thinkging about monopolies, debt, the future of rail transportation, the investment in American business, and such of that time would have had to be different. And it wasn't.
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K4sPRR In the Trains Magazine forum there was a discussion about the PC Cassatt Conference and the idea of national transportation company's. Lets take this a step back, assume there never was a Penn Central and go back to c.1957 when the eastern railroads were really beginning to realize there were problems. The PRR and NYC never merged in this scenario, I am curious as to your thoughts on what would have happened?
One of the points made in Rush Loving's fine "The Men Who Loved Trains" is that the Northeast may well have been better served if both PRR and NYC had been able to succeed in their merger aspirations pre-Penn Central. Pennsy sought to merge with the Wabash and N&W while NYC was part of talks proposing a merger with C&O/B&O....
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Essentially what we have today, with the NS (incl. PRR) and the CSX (incl. NYC), is the reversal of the PC merger and a more appropriate solution. Though when ConRail got broken up some former PRR and NYC lines were swapped around, that's pretty much what we got. Too bad that more of the E-L wasn't saved, however.
Your right about the E-L, here in Ohio much has been abandoned or split up. Also, I agree with your thoughts on the PC, we did end up with a rail system similar to what was originally proposed prior to the PRR/NYC merger. So, lets go a step further...if that was allowed, the PC never came about, what in your thoughts would the railroads be called today?
Anything's possible, but if the two major components of PC had gotten married off to others before joining each other (and before going so deeply in the tank) maybe some part of their names would have survived in today's entities:
The Norfollk Southern name might have "Pennsylvania" somewhere in it now, and CSX might have a real name with some reference to "New York".
Beats me.
K4sPRR ....... So, lets go a step further...if that was allowed, the PC never came about, what in your thoughts would the railroads be called today?
....... So, lets go a step further...if that was allowed, the PC never came about, what in your thoughts would the railroads be called today?
The Cheasapeake, Ohio and New York or CONY (almost like Coney Island), if you add the Reading in there it could be CORNY
and
The Pennsylvania, Norfolk and Western or PAN WESTERN for short.
Serioulsy though, it would be tough to tell as even RRs that stuck around tended to become a different name. ATSF shortened to Santa Fe, Chicago Indianapolis and Louisville became Monon just to name a couple.
Ricky
No Penn Central. Well Al Perlman would probably been able to run the NYC for a lot longer. Maybe Jim McClellen would have ended up as President(of NYC)?
Lets see Pennsy under Stuart Saunders & Bleven as CFO. They might have ended up in jail.
Rgds IGN
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