40 years hence

Conrail light power rolls through Michigan Central Station in Detroit in the late 1970s. John Uckley photo, collection of Brian Schmidt

The “old farts” from a previous blog post have me thinking again – about how remarkable modern railroading is. In spite of what some curmudgeons would lead us to believe, railroading in the past 40 years, since the creation of the late, lamented Conrail, has been remarkably stable. That is my estimation from the trackside perspective, at least.

Big picture, what happened from 1976 to 2016? Conrail was formed from a number of bankrupt railroads, and then dissolved; deregulation brought railroads more freedom to control their own destinies; Ricky Gates’ derailment sparked the railroad safety revolution; Union Pacific gobbled up some of its competitors, and other railroads fell to mergers; GE overtook EMD as the dominant locomotive builder; marginal and underperforming lines were spun off or abandoned; and technology inched forward with positive train control and GPS monitoring.

Now, what happened from 1936 to 1976? Steam gave way to diesel, for the entire industry; the nation’s last interurbans and streetcars ran out their final miles; major passenger stations were complete; millions of dollars of private capital were invested in new passenger trains, which proved to be for naught; Amtrak took over most of what was left; railroads throughout the country went bankrupt, in some cases more than once; color photography changed the way we looked at railroading; CTC and radio eliminated block operators and train orders; and, of course, Trains Magazine began publication, too.

Looking back another four decades, to 1896, the changes are even more dramatic. New railroads were still growing across the continent; the first internal combustion engines came to the industry; streetcars ran in virtually every major, and plenty of lesser, cities; steam locomotives grew larger and stronger, along with rolling stock; and new and improved safety appliances appeared.

Amtrak has existed in largely the same form for the past 40 years, and plenty of diesel locomotives that were on the rails in 1976 are still doing so today in revenue service. About the only locomotive in revenue service in 1976 that was also operating in 1936 was the GG1. Further, the implementation of PTC and GPS in recent years is largely invisible to the trackside observer, unlike the transition from towers and operators to CTC.

And the previous 40 years? Commuters fretted over the fate of the Central of New Jersey and other perennially sick railroads, the passenger train withered almost to the point of irrelevance. It was truly a tough time for the industry.

So the next time you lament the loss of the Katy, the elimination of the caboose, or the proliferation of the latest GE locomotive model, remember this: it could be worse.

Forty years from now, when the railroad historians of the future look back at 2016, what losses will they lament? Probably a lot less than their predecessors did.