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Railroads Seen as Vital to Iowa's Economic Development Policy

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Posted by Deggesty on Monday, December 1, 2014 10:30 AM

It certainly does (did Calvin coin the verb?); I fear the practice is practiced by people who do not know the commonly accepted way to describe an action.

Johnny

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Posted by dakotafred on Monday, December 1, 2014 7:12 AM

Deggesty

Yes, I have long known what a railroad spur is--a track that leads off from another track and then ends without connecting to another track. I was commenting on the use of a noun that describes a spur as though it was a verb. 

I like Balt's response--"Build it and they will come!"--so the track will spur people to come and use the facility.

 

It's called 'verbing.' Calvin, of CALVIN & HOBBES fame, told Hobbes (approvingly), "Verbing weirds the language!"

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Posted by wanswheel on Sunday, November 30, 2014 11:05 PM

greyhounds

first bridge across the Mississippi at (where else)

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Posted by Deggesty on Sunday, November 30, 2014 10:46 PM

Yes, I have long known what a railroad spur is--a track that leads off from another track and then ends without connecting to another track. I was commenting on the use of a noun that describes a spur as though it was a verb. 

I like Balt's response--"Build it and they will come!"--so the track will spur people to come and use the facility.

Johnny

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Posted by Semper Vaporo on Sunday, November 30, 2014 10:25 PM

You are thinking of a different definition of "spur"... the meaning in the article is that of "branching off"... a "RR spur" off of one track to reach a customer's location.

Semper Vaporo

Pkgs.

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Posted by greyhounds on Sunday, November 30, 2014 10:21 PM

Railroads have been vital to Iowa's economic development since around April 21, 1856.  That's the day the Rock Island Railroad completed the first bridge across the Mississippi at (where else?) Rock Island, IL.  The bridge connected rails already laid in Iowa with Chicago, the rest of the US rail network, and with steamships on the Great Lakes.

As for any government economic development plan, I'd be very skeptical.

Remember this sentence:

"A central theme of this book is that railroads, throughout their history, were so important to the US economy that politicians could not leave them alone, and when governments did intervene in transportation markets, they usually made a mess of things."

That's from "American Railroads:  Decline and Renaissance in the 20th Century" by Gallamore and Meyer.  They're two Harvard trained economists who understand transportation economics.  (Meyer died in 2009.)

If only the politicians and bureaucrats will leave this one alone, things will work out fine.

 

"By many measures, the U.S. freight rail system is the safest, most efficient and cost effective in the world." - Federal Railroad Administration, October, 2009. I'm just your average, everyday, uncivilized howling "anti-government" critic of mass government expenditures for "High Speed Rail" in the US. And I'm gosh darn proud of that.
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Posted by BaltACD on Sunday, November 30, 2014 10:17 PM

Deggesty

From the press article--"The additional tracks will increase capacity at Butler Logistics Park and also spur off directly to fertilizer and animal feed plants that export around the country."

I knew of spurring horses (and people) to induce them to go faster; I did not that tracks spurred anything.Smile

 

Build it and they will come!

Sort of like 'Field of Dreams'

 

Never too old to have a happy childhood!

              

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Posted by Deggesty on Sunday, November 30, 2014 9:32 PM

From the press article--"The additional tracks will increase capacity at Butler Logistics Park and also spur off directly to fertilizer and animal feed plants that export around the country."

I knew of spurring horses (and people) to induce them to go faster; I did not that tracks spurred anything.Smile

Johnny

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Railroads Seen as Vital to Iowa's Economic Development Policy
Posted by Victrola1 on Sunday, November 30, 2014 8:53 PM

 BUTLER COUNTY — Snow drifts, frigid temperatures and cutting winds hardly slowed a Carhartt-clad Dave Reed of Iowa Northern Railway on Monday as he chipped ice from tracks No. 9 and 10 in their expanding rail yard northwest of Shell Rock....

http://thegazette.com/subject/news/rail-vital-part-of-the-transportation-system-in-iowa-20141129

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