SP

[Anonymous]

why did sp sell themselves?!?!?! i miss the dirty rusty equipment :(
and UP looks horrible in the west

[Anonymous]

thanks for the reply

[bobwilcox]

Railroads and I think all organizations go through life cycles. The SP grew from 1850-1910, harvested from 1910-1965 and went into a death spiral from 1965-1996.
You can't live forever.

[fuzzybroken]

Ok, so what about UP? How long will it survive? [;)]
Besides, it won't be long, UP's equipment will all be dirty and rusty too... [swg]

-Mark
http://www.geocities.com/fuzzybroken

[Overmod]

Yeah, except I think the REAL seeds of its death were laid a bit later, after the abortive Reichman takeover debacle in the '80s that tried to give us SPSF.

Don't know if anyone remembers the Janus bubble at Illinois Central, but SP had something of their own up their sleeve that would have been a cash cow... it came out of their use of railroad microwave links for communications-backbone traffic; anyone care to speculate what the SP in "Sprint Telecommunications" stood for?

As part of the SLSF business, SP was required to divest itself of the telecommunications business. That left it exactly as indicated -- overcapitalized with things that didn't pay, undercapitalized with meaningful operating assets, and ultimately associated with good old Phil Anschutz thanks to the post-Reichman fire sale after Olympia & York imploded. Whether or not an SP that survived to the 21st Century on the strength of Sprint would have gone under by now because of the tech crash, I can't say.

[fuzzybroken]

Overmod,

Don't you mean Janus -> KCS? And SPSF instead of SLSF (that would be "Frisco")? [%-)]

I don't think SP-Sprint would have been too horribly affected by the tech crash. Even Sprint itself had two separate stocks, one for the main telecom "FON Group" and one for wireless.

A proud Sprint PCS user since 2001,
-Mark
http://www.geocities.com/fuzzybroken

[Overmod]

Yeah, you're 100% right on both posts -- not paying attention to details; ironically enough I thought I carefully checked "SPSF" to ensure it wasn't SLSF by mistake... The point, though, remains the same, which is that the subsidiaries sometimes acquire far more importance than the original 'mission' of the company. I hadn't recognized the oil contribution to UP until it was pointed out here. Wonder how much of the PC deficits were covered by the real-estate operations (which were certainly good enough to keep a non-railroad "PC" around for many years!)

I was a proud Sprint user in the 1980s -- and delighted with it. Not quite as delighted with the coverage of their PCS data services, though.

[bobwilcox]

Mark is correct. People will need stuff in the future. It will be made somewhere and consumed somewhere and a freight rr has to connect the somewheres if it is going to make sense.

If the country decides coal has more risks than rewards there will be wrenching changes in traffic patterns and all bets will be off. What railroads will look like coming out the other end is just a guess. The surviving railroads will need to bring in people like Mike Wal***o pull through to the other side.

[Overmod]

Where does the line form for signed copies of the upcoming book?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by M.W. Hemphill

Article, actually ...

Last book I did required 3,000 hours. I'm not very enthusiastic about repeating that experience!

3,000 hours? That is hardly a year's work! What did you do in your free time? [:)]

[Anonymous]

Let's see, SP was bought out by CP, but kept the SP name, then they bought out UP, but kept the UP name, so in reallity, you're really talking about why did CP buyout SP and UP.

And really, all it is, is 3 companies that were at one time owned by the same person finally becoming one corporation.