RWY. versus RY. versus R .R.

[Anonymous]

here's some historical questions . when do you use the acronym RY. and when do you use R.R.? does it depend on the size, the country, or the whim of the builders? and i notice that some loco cabs have RWY. stenciled on the side instead of RY...(as a matter of fact, i DO have time on my hands...)

[gabe]

This is also interesting when a desired corporate name is taken and one wants to label their railroad a particular name.

For instance, the Indiana "Rail Road" is called the Indiana "Rail Road" because there used to be a small interurban called the Indiana "Railroad."

Gabe

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

Bankruptcies and other financial reorganizations will often lead to a change in name from "railroad" to "railway" since a new corporate entity is formed to receive the assets of the bankrupt entity in a Chapter 11 re-organization.

Gabe:
The Indiana Railroad could hardly be described as a small interurban. There is (was?) a shortline known as the Southern Indiana Ry. that is the last operating remnant of the original Indiana Railroad and may have the rights to that name, hence the use of the "Indiana Rail Road" name by the regional railroad on the former IC branch.

[Anonymous]

There is a tendency (a very, very small correlation so don't beat me up!) for a RailWAY to have some sort of British input in its history, while the term RailROAD is more specifically USA.

Frequently it doesn't work, but consider the Chicago & North Western Railway. Prior to its assumption by UP about ten years ago, the road used moveable semaphore signals, the trains ran on the left, and it had had a great deal of British capital put into it in the late 19th-early 20th Century. Metra trains operated by UP out of Chicago's Ogilvie Transportation Center (previously Chicago & North Western Station) still run on the left. [;)]

I just learned today that the (Atchison, Topeka &) Santa Fe RailROAD changed its name to . . . Railway in 1895. Could that have been due to some kind of rescue by English capital following the New York bank panic and recession of 1894? No way could I predict that, but Santa Fe followers might want to answer this one...[?]

Both railway and railroad are perfectly acceptable American English, though outside the USA it is railway almost all of the time. [:)]