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[quote user="greyhounds"][quote user="MichaelSol"] [quote user="JonathanS"] Your own data here shows the fallacy of Brown's study.  Between 1945 and 1956 the C&IM lost over 40% of its traffic.  Had they kept the steam locomotives that existed in 1945 the results would have been only 212 ton miles per pound of TE.  Certainly not good utilization of capital equipment.  The C&IM made the correct decision by purchasing diesels that would spend less time in the roundhouse and could be used more hours each day allowing all road, peddler, and switching jobs to be covered by a lesser number of locomotives.  [/quote]My entire point was that the traffic declined. The original poster felt that the conversion from a large number of steam to a smaller number of diesels reflected an inherent efficiency. No, it reflected a substantially smaller traffic load, and reflected the official retirement of an elderly class of locomotives -- many of which were probably being cannabalized -- and replacement with a fully working class. And those numbers were considerably fewer because, as the original poster declined to admit -- the tonnage carried had dropped significantly.[/quote]Of course traffic declined after 1945 (the year you cited)  WWII ended.  So freaking what?  Leave it to you to pick a peak traffic World War year and compare it to 10 years latter and say "business declined".The impressive results of buying diesels, as in replacing 30 active steam engines with 11 diesels, stands.  But it doen't tell the story you want, so you, once again, resort to fantasy railroading.You create a fantasy in which C&IM management wastefully (and stupidly) kept a junkyard of unused steam locomotives as a potential parts supply.  No.  They were acquiring steam locomotives as late as 1952.  Now they wouldn't be buying locomoitves if they had surplus locomotives, now would they be?  They needed 30 active steam locomotives to operate the railroad.The railroad's management had three options in the mid 50s.  1) Just keep going like they were.  There was no crisis.  The freight was being moved.  No need for a change to diesel power.2) Buy relatively new, "modern" steam 2nd hand.  Virtually any type of steam locomotive was available at basically scrap value.  If continued steam would have been viable this would have been a very attractive option.  The fact that experienced railroad management didn't go this way on a 'coal road' speaks volumes.3) Buy new diesels.  They took two EMD demonstrators, evaluated them, then bought two SW1200s, evaluated them, then junked steam.   And 11 diesel locomotives replaced 30 steam locomotives.Now these were just "11" locomotives.  No one had jumped off a cliff here.  If diesels were a mistake, they were a mistake that could be fixed.  There was a market for those diesels.  They could be sold.By 1960-1962 the C&IM had had years to evaluate the diesels' performance.  And they needed more power.  More coal was moving to the "Powerton" generating station near Pekin and a 2nd Taylorville-Havana turn was going to be added.  And once again, good, "modern" 2nd hand steam locomoitives were available.  If there had been a "mistake" they could have corrected it by buying used steam.What did they do?  They went back to EMD for more diesels. Now you can sit there all day saying that steam was the better choice, but the people running the numbers bought diesels.  And no, they were not stupid.[/quote]Is this the same C&IM who's owners - a few short years after dieselization - tried to jettison by offering the line for $1?  (Yep, that's one dollar!)And there were no takers!
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