1880's railroad engineering

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Railway Man

[many snips] I believe you can learn everything necessary about the science of location in A.M. Wellington's "The Economic Theory of Railway Location."  And you can read how Wellington's lessons were applied -- or misapplied -- in James Vance's "The Geography of the North American Railway."  I think you cannot possibly buy any other railway book that have even 5% of the knowledge, sweep, and truth of these two.  [emphasis added - PDN.]

(An interesting anecdote:  I chose the job I am in now specifically because of the man I would work for, who is not known to anyone outside of the railway industry but has been there and left his mark on the North American railway map in the last 30 years -- oh, things like the Conrail merger, the CN-EJ&E merger, etc.  I interviewed with him and accepted the job entirely by telephone.  When I walked into his office for the first time, I saw on his bookshelves the railway books he wanted to have at his fingertips at work, and the only two books other than reference material were Wellington and Vance.  It didn't surprise me at all.)

RWM

More info on the referenced books:

The Economic Theory of the Location of Railways: An analysis of the conditions controlling the laying out of railways to effect the most judicious expenditure of capital, Arthur Mellen Wellington, WIley, 6th ed. 1914, 980 pp.(hardcover), ASIN B00086P1J6 or B000NPBCIQ.  Amazon currently lists 2, 1 at $110.00 and 1 at $133.91.  Amazon also lists 1 of the 1887 ed. as a "collectible" for $200.00 from Powell's Books (notably, the largest independent bookstore - based in Portland Oregon, and really good people, from my visit and dealings with them).  If you want that one, better move quick, because I've got my eye on it, too

The North American Railroad: Its Origin, Evolution, and Geography (Creating the North American Landscape), James E. Vance, Jr. (Professor Emeritus of Geography, Univ. of California - Berkeley, 1925-1999), Johns Hopkins University Press, 1st ed. 1995, 384 pp. (hardcover), ISBN 0-8018-4573-4.  Amazon lists it as available used from $4.34, "new" from $31.34 to $39.00 (5 supposedly available).  Of the 2 reviews there, the 5-star wanted more maps; the 3-star decried the "university verbiage" sentences.

- Paul North.

[Railway Man]

 abebooks.com is a vastly better source because you're dealing directly with the used/rare book dealer, don't have the useless Amazon markup, and you get a much better deal because you have transparency to the dealer who cares about your business.  I've purchased more than 1,000 books through abebooks with not one bad result.

 Best price on abebooks is $9.98 for Wellington (1/10 of Amazon's low, low prices), and $9.94 for Vance.  Check the shipping price on Amazon compared to the private dealer, too.

RWM 

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Hey, thanks much, RailWay Man ! 

That's definitely a better resource - they list 11 of the Wellington book, for example.

However, and just FYI - the $9.98 Wellington is apparently an "e-version", not a "hard copy" format.  A softcover reprint is available for $34, which is good enough for me.

Also, not to rain on your parade, but their "Company Information" page now says:

"AbeBooks Inc. is a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc. AbeBooks, an online bookselling pioneer, was acquired in December 2008 and remains a stand-alone operation with headquarters in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, and a European office in Dusseldorf, Germany."  [emphasis added - PDN]  

Nevertheless, I'll take your recommendation as stated.  Thanks again.

- Paul North.

P.S. - A 1,000 books, eh ?  I don't doubt you - in fact, all the better !  You'll make me look so good by comparison the next time my wife and I debate the space that my book & magazine collection takes up !  (Note that I'm not asking how many you still have - but I'm sure the answer is "Almost all", right ?)  A moderator on another forum - screen name George Harris - once described those of us in this business as something like "inveterate packrats" because the really good books and references are no longer published and so are hard to come by.  I sit here and gaze up at a pocket-sized hard-back copy of Railroad Curves and Earthwork by C. Frank Allen, McGraw-Hill, 1931, and think to myself, "Yeah, I represent that remark . . . ".- PDN.

 

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

One further observation or question on the Wellington and Vance books that's interesting, and maybe a little scary, too:

Note that it's effectively a century between them - 1887 or so to 1914 for Wellington, and 1995 for Vance - and there's nothing else worthwhile in the meantime ?

And while I'm on my soapbox  [OK, keyboard], it seems we have another example of "White's Law of Railroad Scholarship"* on display here:

We're all discussing the theory and practice of railroad locations and alignments here, but - aside from RWM's emphasis on the threshold question of whether or how the railroad should be there at all, etc. - unless we're next going to be discussing the construction proposed line from the Lower 48 U.S. states to Alaska or similar, this is all pretty much academic (only).  Now that the Abo Canyon 2nd track addition is underway, and the DM&E expansion has been approved, I'm not aware of any other major railroad construction, extension, or relocation projects that are looming in the near future that would put this theory into practice.  Then again, maybe I just don't know about them - yet.

* - First postulated by John H. White, Jr., former Curator of the Museum of Land Transportation [or similar title] at the Smithsonian Institution, and author of numerous books on our favorite subject, in a Trains "Turntable" column on the inside back page of the magazine sometime in the 1970's:

"The amount of scholarship devoted to a railroad subject is in inverse proportion to its importance."

- Paul North.

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Modelcar

Paul_D_North_Jr

Further (and farther), I'm not aware of any other possible alignment through Pennsylvania as good, that gets a railroad between those two endpoints.

 

Paul....I'm curious, have you looked over the 1885 alignment of the partially completed South Penn RR  R of W and how it might have compared to bridge the distance between Harrisburg and the Pittsburgh area....As you probably know the original Pennsylvania Turnpike roughly followed it when it was constructed and opened in Oct. 1940.

Quentin -

No, other than having driven over it maybe a dozen times (mostly in darkness at one end of the day or the other, unfortunately, so I really couldn't appreciate it much).

That area is very tough to compare alignments in, because it's essentially a chain of parallel mountain ridges across the most desirable direction of the alignment, without any obvious or clear-cut pass or other feature to lead towards a preferred solution.  From what little I know of it, any analysis tends to wind up being circular - i.e., "If I go this way, that is a pretty good route", but there's several routes that might meet that criteria, and not a lot to differentiate one way or route over another.

Considering the dynamics or "railroad geo-politics*" of the South Penn - it was built as a rate-breaking "spoiler" line by Andrew Carnegie in cahoots with the NYC, as I recall.  (Somewhere in there the PRR started the West Shore as a putative competitor to the NYC - not sure which of these was first or as revenge, though.)  Anyway, as you know the mutual chicanery and maneuverings were ended by a deal brokered by J. P. Morgan on his yacht Corsair, and everyone involved "got a haircut", in the current vernacular, one result of which was that the South Penn was immediately abandoned as it then was.  This says a couple of things to me:

- Maybe the PRR already had already claimed and occupied the best route over the Alleghenies in central Pennsylvania.  Just because the South Penn was built later - not that many years later, either - and in a different place doesn't necessarily mean that it was better.  That different location might have been the "next best" one available; and/ or,

- The South Penn likely was not that much better - however one defines better, perhaps in this context in terms of new on-line traffic sources for the costs required of the new construction - of a route than Horse Shoe Curve.  Otherwise, the PRR would have claimed and used the South Penn, perhaps instead of the later "Mule Shoe" route that paralleled and bypassed Horse Shoe Curve to the south from Hollidaysburg to Gallitzin Summit.

Finally - proving once again the educational and analytical value of this forum and posting to it (at least to me), I just made the following connection in responding to your post - accepting your 1885 date for the South Penn alignment:

The 1885 South Penn RR and West Shore RR debacle might well have been the motivation (or "last straw") that prompted the Interstate Commerce Commission Act of 1887  ("ICC Act"), if I've got that date right.  It's now known that the ICC Act was to make the railroad cartelization (OPEC-like) of the late 1800's enforceable on all the players, and that the ICC Act was in fact drafted by a PRR lawyer.  (George W. Hilton wrote several lengthy articles on this and related subjects in Trains in the late 1960's and early 1970's, cited historian Albro Martin if I recall that correctly.)  Having sufferered through and from this bitter and expensive situation and machinations at Carnegie's instigation (sound familiar to today's financial chicanery ?), I have no trouble believing that the men of the PRR - mainly engineers/ businessmen such as J. Edgar Thomson and Alexander J. Cassatt - were fed up with it all, and hence determined to prevent it from ever happening to them again.  Perhaps having failed to prevent it on their own, the next best way to accomplish that would be to invoke the force of law and power of the Federal government (I'll leave it to someone else to say which was the more powerful organization back in that day . . . ).

Well, that's enough on this for now.  Thanks for asking, and the opprtunity to think this through a little bit - I hope this is responsive to your inquiry. 

- Paul North.

* - Back in the mid-1970's I went to a evening lecture by a Univ. of Pennsylvania professor on this subject.  It was all very interesting, but as it was just prior to ConRail, it seemed strangely divorced from reality.  When almost every NorthEast US railroad was in bankruptcy and struggling to survive, playing such games with each other - a favorite tactic and entertainment of corporate lawyers such as Stuart T. Saunders of PennCentral and his kind, by the way - while ignoring the fundamental problems of poor track, old equipment, and especially non-competitive rates and service, was kind of like "arranging deck chairs on the Titanic":  "Yes, you may cut out your competitor and merge with another railroad, but at the end of the day you're all still going to be broke."  It seemed to me then - and now - that their efforts would have been better directed to other goals.

[Deggesty]

Murphy Siding

     I've picked up bits and pieces in this thread,  suggesting that some monumental engineering projects could have been less costly, if perhaps the lines were laid out differently.  What were some of those?  Off the top of my head,  I'm thinking of things like the Starrucca Viaduct, or Moffet Tunnel, or Lucien  Cut-off(?)  I'm giving the engineers the benefit of the doubt,  assuming that they made the best decisions, most of the time.  (But then,  I sometimes work with architects, who are good examples of puttingego before common sense.)

Murphy, I don’t know that the Lucin Cutoff could have been better located; its location is certainly superior to that of the original line in that it eliminated much mountain running with curves and grades and distance (48 miles shorter). Since the route is across open water, it is subject to wave damage as well as wind damage, and is not cheap to maintain. After the causeway was constructed, replacing much of the original trestle, with two culverts to carry water between the north and south arms of the lake, it was discovered that the culverts did not allow sufficient waterflow to prevent a much higher salt buildup in the south arm (more freshwater comes into the northern arm), so the causeway was breached about twenty-six years ago to increase the waterflow.

The WP’s route, around the south end of the lake, also called for some high maintenance twenty-six years ago when there was an early snowmelt on the west side of the Wasatch; the waves were lapping at the track.

Johnny

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

samfp1943

To pose another position; the early railroad construction IMHO was built in a race for expediency. To construct a railline; to go from point A to B, first, to prove it could be done, and secondly garner the rewards of more and better funding., To capturing the travelers, and freight between those two points. With labor back then as cheap, and somewhat available as it apparently was; with the loadings fairly light. 

   The requirements of the types of cars and locomotives, being fairly forgiving of the 'fast and dirty' laid track. The first idea was to make the mosr money and then improve the structure as traffic demanded, serviceability and not longevity was the apparent goal.  Only after a line could prove its ability to earn for its company did the strengthening and overbuilding take place.  

As Confederate Cavalry General Nathan Bedford Forrest once supposedly said, military victory most often goes to "...whoever gets there firstest with the mostest..." [from an Army Logistics Command webpage, appropriately enough - see: http://www.almc.army.mil/alog/issues/MarApr97/systems.htm ; emphasis added - PDN]  Also: "A good track today is better than a perfect track tomorrow", to paraphrase Gen. George S. Patton, Jr.

In this context, it's worth remembering that - which was not always known or done back in the day - especially with regard to the logistics problem.  Until the railroad was actually built and in place, it was very difficult to get all those supplies, materials, and equipment for the construction far enough out in advance to avoid delaying that operation.  Once the railroad was up and running, though, it was much easier and cheaper do anything, esp. to get the big, heavy, and long things - like steel bridge pieces - out to where they were needed.  Then dhe rebuilding or relocation could hopefully be done more deliberately and purposefully for the circumstances, esp. once the revenue stream had started coming in.  But until the system was connected and operating, it just wasn't practical to get that or such things as tunnels done far enough or long enough in advance. In effect, the railroad was its own lifeline.  Once built, it could always be improved.  But a railroad that stopped even a few mile short of its goal didn't accomplish and wasn't worth much.

- Paul North.

[henry6]

Railway Man

 

You've seen the ROIs?  What were they, out of curiosity?  I threw the DL&W onto the list as a possible example not because I know of its ROI, but because I'm curious.  It was an expensive project.  I'm aware the new line was an engineering improvement but I'm not aware if it was an economic improvement, nor has the railfan press ever bothered to answer that question that I know of.  I'd like to see numbers that satisfy the question -- then we'd know if it was a monument to clear thinking or a monument to clients' ego and consultants' fees.

RWM

 Checking through both Taber and Taber and Young, neither books go into ROI statistics but explain the Cut Offs in larger terms of modernizing the railroad allowing for bigger and heavier locomotives, longer and heavier trains, and faster speeds for both passenger and frieght all as part of the benefits of the projects.  Taber and Taber offer tables on revenue and profitablity of the Erie, CNJ, LV, and DL&W as a result of their modernization programs from 1900 to 1914 to 1926 on Page 53 of DL&W in the 20th Century, Vol. 1 in a general discussion of the benefits of the programs on the same pages.  The whole chapter is devoted to all the modernization programs including both Cut Offs, other concrete bridges, fills, and additional tracks which were added.  Young in his Tunkhannock, The Great White Bridge revised and reprinted in 2005 also extols the effeciencies achieved and allowed rather than an ROI figure.  

But, using that information, backed by how railroads were "rationalized" in the early and mid 1800's, replaces the need for an ROI.  Railroads in the East were built on routes that went to the natural rescources which were needed in the larger, coastal cities.  And they were often built through cities and towns where financing was offered rather than because the cities and towns were in the path between two distant points.  Plus railroad fever of the time demanded a railroad in everytown no matter what.  That was the East from 1840 to 1890,  So engineering was done to meet the need of then and there.  When all was laid out, by 1895-1900, new engineering was able to step in and undo the bad in places, and look at the emerging prospect of moving freight and passengers to and from the coast and mid and far west rather than just from the mountains to the Atlantic, and be a 20th Century railroad..  Yes, the Erie Canal, and by concept the Erie Railroad, were midwest to coast links.  But the Erie, its components, and virtually all other rail lines, were built to local needs of the time first.  The new Century needed a total revamping of the railroad system before the Century began.  It is almost like Phillip's latest TRAINS column is a report on a 21st Century repeat of railroad improvement projects.

[Modelcar]

Paul_D_North_Jr

Thanks for asking, and the opprtunity to think this through a little bit - I hope this is responsive to your inquiry

 

Paul....an excellent response.  Enjoyed every bit of it.  The South Penn has been an interest of mine since a very young fellow.....If you do get the chance to travel thru on the Turnpike in daylight you might keep a lookout for old alignments from the South Penn, as they are still visible in the area {in general}, between Allegheny tunnel and Donegal area at locations where the Turnpike is not positioned right on the old alignment.

And lots of mileage is not....The South Penn was attacking the Allegheny and Laurel Hill ranges with  a max of 2% and the Turnpike softened that to 3% max....So the old alignment is more circuitous that allowed the two alignments to enter the same tunnel locations that were started back in the 1885 event.

One thing for sure.....They did not follow any creeks or streams thru this general area.....Somerset County is a Plateau of roughly 2,000' elevation and the mountain ridges at the east and west ends....

And yes, Mule Shoe entered into this area {of the Pennsy alignment}, and was used up to a decade or so ago....prehaps 2 decades now.....

 

[Northtowne]

I would like to comment on one part of "1880's railroad engineering", and that is of the steel structures (bridges). By 1880 or soon thereafter these structures were not designed "by the seat of the pants". They were designed for certain conditions and loadings (L3, L4, etc) depending on the railroad input regarding equipment to travel on the road. Most were through truss and/or plate girder designs. Structural Engineers would use this input to analyze the forces on the members and size them accordingly. Truss analysis is very accurate in that the forces are "determinatable", therefore most long spans were truss type. Plate girders were most often used on approach spans and short span conditions. They are more complicated to design in that there are secondary forces (moments) that are  "indeterminate", but there were accurate design methods for these back then, also. The accepted design standard was (and is) to load steel members to approx 2/3 of the expected yield of the steel. This is a large safety factor and many 1900 bridges are still in use today. True, some have been reinforced but many are as they were built. I just wanted say that steel structure design methods were quite advanced in the period dicussed in this thread.  There is an 1895 three span swing truss bridge across the Coosa River in Gadsden, AL, where I live, that carries grain trains with 3 to 4 SD-45's for power. It is easy to see all of the bridge very close and there is no sign of additions or modification. It could use a paint job but CSXT said they had better places to spend their money and assured the City of Gadsden that is was structually sound and that they inspected it regularly.

 Northtowne 

 

 

[henry6]

Checked another book: The Lackawanna Railroad in Northwest New Jersey  by Larry Lowenthal and William T. Greenberg, Jr. and they also expouse the virtues and resulting abilities and yields of modernizing the plant rather than checking in with ROI figures.  What I am beginning to feel is that today's engineers, like so many of today's investors, are so consumed by short term ROI as the guidepost by which all is done, that overall improvement and long term investment have not entered into contemporary business decsions at all.   None of that has to do with the quality of 19th Century engineering and design toward longevity but reveals that today's short term goals and design either lead to poor quality or reflects the short sightedness on the part of our Salons of Commerce! But again, Don Phillips latest column states that railroad companies have moved toward the 1900 era of thought investingin  modernizing and improvments to be prepared in the long term for what is to come.  Ironically it comes in the same decade of the 21st Century!

[Murphy Siding]

henry6

Checked another book: The Lackawanna Railroad in Northwest New Jersey  by Larry Lowenthal and William T. Greenberg, Jr. and they also expouse the virtues and resulting abilities and yields of modernizing the plant rather than checking in with ROI figures.  What I am beginning to feel is that today's engineers, like so many of today's investors, are so consumed by short term ROI as the guidepost by which all is done, that overall improvement and long term investment have not entered into contemporary business decsions at all.   

I'm not sure I agree with your train of thought on this.  I interpret it as saying something along the lines of " We *think* or *feel* that it was a good investment, but no one ever actually checked the numbers-before or after, to see if it was."  Perhaps, they didn't want to know the answer?  Or, they *felt* it was the right thing to do?

[henry6]

Would not the prosperity of the railroads mentioned be indicative of the value of the investment?  The roads were able to operate heavier locomotives, longer trains, at faster point to point speeds than they were able to on the twisted, up and down, longer routes they replaced.  A Mountain or Northern or Wyoming or Berkshire would never have been able to deliver the larger sized loads in the same  performed if it were not for the improvements like the lack of or enlargment of tunnels, the relief of grades, the elimination of circles and circles of curves, and the strenghtening of or replacement of bridges.   Look at the tables presented in the Tabers' work.  It is obvious that the cost of the improvements paid off.  If they hadn't, those lines would never have reached the 20's much less weatherd the 30's and handled the 40s ans survived into the 50s.  The PRR and NYC roads and thier own investments would have killed off any competition which hadn't likewise improved.  We work in a world today in which bits and bytes intrpret and predict...if the computer doesn't say so, it ain't so.  So many buisnesses which operate only off computer read outs die and quick death.  Those who have a gut or feel or talent or bent or whatever you want to call it for thier business will succeed because they; look beyond the bits and bytes for the answers.  I have seen many small businesses close within a year of inception because the ownersunderstood only the computer numbers but neither the business itself nor the customers they sought to serve. 

[Murphy Siding]

henry6

Would not the prosperity of the railroads mentioned be indicative of the value of the investment? 

  Perhaps,  but indicative of the value....and a sound investment of the money might not be the same thing.  Consider it to be the difference between them having the feeling that it was a good investment, verses them running the numbers to prove it was a good investment of capital.  I'm not convinced the feeling is the proof in itself.

[Railway Man]

Deggesty

Murphy Siding

     I've picked up bits and pieces in this thread,  suggesting that some monumental engineering projects could have been less costly, if perhaps the lines were laid out differently.  What were some of those?  Off the top of my head,  I'm thinking of things like the Starrucca Viaduct, or Moffet Tunnel, or Lucien  Cut-off(?)  I'm giving the engineers the benefit of the doubt,  assuming that they made the best decisions, most of the time.  (But then,  I sometimes work with architects, who are good examples of puttingego before common sense.)

Murphy, I don’t know that the Lucin Cutoff could have been better located; its location is certainly superior to that of the original line in that it eliminated much mountain running with curves and grades and distance (48 miles shorter). Since the route is across open water, it is subject to wave damage as well as wind damage, and is not cheap to maintain. After the causeway was constructed, replacing much of the original trestle, with two culverts to carry water between the north and south arms of the lake, it was discovered that the culverts did not allow sufficient waterflow to prevent a much higher salt buildup in the south arm (more freshwater comes into the northern arm), so the causeway was breached about twenty-six years ago to increase the waterflow.

The WP’s route, around the south end of the lake, also called for some high maintenance twenty-six years ago when there was an early snowmelt on the west side of the Wasatch; the waves were lapping at the track.

Johnny

All good observations.

I hope this doesn't come across as picky, but terminology is important and the Lucin Cut-off is properly described as a "line change" not a "relocation."  A line change improves or revises the line but there is no fundamental change in the function, traffic equation, or economic equation of the railway facility.  A relocation, in contrast, is a reassessment of the original business model.  An example of a relocation is the D&RGW relegating its original narrow-gauge main line via Marshall Pass to branch-line status and constructing a new standard-gauge main line via Tennessee Pass, in order to begin participating in transcontinental traffic flows, and emerging from a purely local/regional business model into a national business model.

There are some of us who think that the Lucin Cut-off wasn't a great idea.  The major problem is that the fill is continuously sinking into the lake bottom because it is denser than the mud bottom of the lake.  As a result the lake bottom has actually been displaced and pushed up to the point where it breaks through the water surface on either side of the fill!  What is now known is that the original M-K constructed fill of the D.J. Russell era was very marginal from a geotechnical point of view, barely in equilibrium with the weight-bearing capacity of the lake bottom.  Subsequent additions of rock to the fill to get its height above the 1983 lake rise increased its weight to the point where the lake bottom has transistioned from stable to plastic, and gone into motion that once started doesn't want to stop.  The mud is several thousand feet thick, and in effect the battle to add rock to the fill is an effort to fill the entire basin with rock.  If the lake level rises abruptly again as it did in 1983, it may become physically impossible to add rock faster than the water rises and the fill sinks, and we may be seeing a recapture of the original alignment via Promontory Pass, or a permanent diversion to the former WP.

RWM

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

tree68

Paul - Funny you should mention the river thing.   One of our regular local runs follows a river fairly closely for most of its route, crossing said river three times in the process.

One other very important and practical reason for the early railroads to follow the streams, which I forgot to mention yesterday:

Those steam locomotives needed a ready source of a lot of water to operate properly  (since we never adopted the use of exhaust-steam condensing locomotives on any wide-scale basis).

- Paul North.

[Murphy Siding]

Deggesty

Murphy, I don’t know that the Lucin Cutoff could have been better located; its location is certainly superior to that of the original line in that it eliminated much mountain running with curves and grades and distance (48 miles shorter). Since the route is across open water, it is subject to wave damage as well as wind damage, and is not cheap to maintain. After the causeway was constructed, replacing much of the original trestle, with two culverts to carry water between the north and south arms of the lake, it was discovered that the culverts did not allow sufficient waterflow to prevent a much higher salt buildup in the south arm (more freshwater comes into the northern arm), so the causeway was breached about twenty-six years ago to increase the waterflow.

The WP’s route, around the south end of the lake, also called for some high maintenance twenty-six years ago when there was an early snowmelt on the west side of the Wasatch; the waves were lapping at the track.

Johnny

  I picked the Lucin Cutoff, off the top of my head.  The reason being, I've read so many times, how UP has had to dump (and keep dumping) 8 gazillion tons of rock, just to keep the tracks above water.  It makes you wonder- if this was the best solution to the problem, what were some of the others put forth?  Maybe the answer, is what will UP do, if it loses the battle with the lake?

[henry6]

As I review the ROI question and my responses, I also come up with the question: ROI aside, what would have happened to railroads in the 20th Century, especially eastern railroads, if they had not re-engineered their plants in the early 1900's?

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Railway Man

[much snipped]

Examples of what I would list as first-order errors include new construction and heavy line changes:

1. Milwaukee Road Puget Sound Extension
2. Colorado Midland
3. Western Pacific
4. Lackawanna Cut-Off (possibly, but I'm not sufficently familiar with the traffic potential of this very densely packed and complicated area to be sure)
5. The Missouri Pacific-funded heavy reconstruction of the D&RGW Royal Gorge Route alignment between 1923 and 1929.
6. C&O Chicago Extension (possibly).

[more snips]

RWM

RWM -

To add to your list of early 20th-century first-order errors (above), I'll suggest the Western Maryland RR's Connellsville Extension (or whatever they called it), along the Potomac & other rivers from Cumberland, MD towards (but not quite to) Pittsburgh, PA.  It was magnificently engineered with several wonderfully long and huge truss bridges and trestle / viaducts, and even bypassed the B&O's (now CSX) Sand Patch grades with a shorter route, but it didn't have a single branch, and basically paralleled the B&O the whole way.  Even after acquiring the WM, CSX's predecessor still chose to keep the old alignment.  It's been abandoned and torn up about 20 - 25 years now, and is now a great rail-trail. 

Much the same could be said about the rest of the abandoned WM, from Hagerstown to Cumberland, but at least at Cumberland there was a major branch to the southwest that justified the existence that portion.

I still want to respond to and clarify some other points of our above discussion yesterday of location vs. alignment in economic terms, streams, traffic sources, etc., but time constraints preclude that right at the moment - maybe later on this evening.

- Paul North.

[diningcar]

Numbers - Numbers!  It is nice to have methods and formulas which provide satisfaction that we are about to do the right thing. But the source of and reliability of the basic assumption numbers which are applied to the methods and formulas is where the great potential for erronious results lie. This is especially true when applied to line changes or major yard construction projects after the RR has established itself as a viable enterprise. It was not so apparent in the 19th century  when RR's were built into yet undeveloped locales.

With the initial RR construction to locations where no RR existed the potential was perhaps more speculation than science. Thus encentives such as Land Grants were offered as an ingrediant to ROI. And the abandonment of entire RR's or branch lines constructed in the 19th century is indicative of assumptions or speculations which proved erronious. ROI could be computed in the 19th century but assumption numbers were very speculative. IRR (internal rate of return)  was measured with alternatives in another business or the stock and bond market, if indeed IRR was even considered by other than the very astute investors.

Todays RR's must use IRR to compare projects which compete for investment funds and the "savings" or "additional revenue" numbers must be checked by a "post audit" to ascertain how the results compare to the assumptions. A prime example of a failed investment (and in fairness not a bad assumption which could be foreseen) was the Santa Fe's investments in the 1970's at Oklahoma City which enabled it to exclusively serve a new General Motors assembly plant that is closed and will not reopen. Savings which justify expenditure are a principal source of error (or manipulation by those wanting their project approved). Post audits are necessary to find that, for example, the reduction of two swich engine assignments, or any other saving actually occurred.

Also, IRR evaluates the "time value" of the assumption numbers. Thus a saving of $100,000.00 per year today is, if continuous, worth perhaps $5000.00 per year in 15 years dependant upon the interest rate assumed. It is a complicated scene competing for investment dollars and it appears to me that today's major RR's are very astute with their choices.

 

 

 

 

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

diningcar

Numbers - Numbers!  It is nice to have methods and formulas which provide satisfaction that we are about to do the right thing. But the source of and reliability of the basic assumption numbers which are applied to the methods and formulas is where the great potential for erronious results lie. This is especially true when applied to line changes or major yard construction projects after the RR has established itself as a viable enterprise. It was not so apparent in the 19th century  when RR's were built into yet undeveloped locales.

With the initial RR construction to locations where no RR existed the potential was perhaps more speculation than science. Thus encentives such as Land Grants were offered as an ingrediant to ROI. And the abandonment of entire RR's or branch lines constructed in the 19th century is indicative of assumptions or speculations which proved erronious. ROI could be computed in the 19th century but assumption numbers were very speculative. IRR (internal rate of return)  was measured with alternatives in another business or the stock and bond market, if indeed IRR was even considered by other than the very astute investors. [snipped]

We should keep in mind that much of the railroad construction in the late 1800's and early 1900's was essentially the "venture capital" segment or the equivalent of today's Silicon Valley businesses of the era - as BaltACD said, the "rocket science" and "brain surgery" of the day.  So we should not be too surprised that the failure rate and "cannibalization" following was fairly high - railroading was by no means a mature science or a settled business.

- Paul North.

[Railway Man]

Paul_D_North_Jr

RWM -

To add to your list of early 20th-century first-order errors (above), I'll suggest the Western Maryland RR's Connellsville Extension (or whatever they called it), along the Potomac & other rivers from Cumberland, MD towards (but not quite to) Pittsburgh, PA.  It was magnificently engineered with several wonderfully long and huge truss bridges and trestle / viaducts, and even bypassed the B&O's (now CSX) Sand Patch grades with a shorter route, but it didn't have a single branch, and basically paralleled the B&O the whole way.  Even after acquiring the WM, CSX's predecessor still chose to keep the old alignment.  It's been abandoned and torn up about 20 - 25 years now, and is now a great rail-trail. 

Much the same could be said about the rest of the abandoned WM, from Hagerstown to Cumberland, but at least at Cumberland there was a major branch to the southwest that justified the existence that portion.

I still want to respond to and clarify some other points of our above discussion yesterday of location vs. alignment in economic terms, streams, traffic sources, etc., but time constraints preclude that right at the moment - maybe later on this evening.

- Paul North.

 

Excellent example.  The location was poor. There was no traffic source to pay for all that construction.

RWM

[Modelcar]

Railway Man

but it didn't have a single branch,

I might comment the WM did have trackage rights from Rockwood north thru Somerset and on over the Boswell Branch of {then B&O}, to Gray, Pa., to pull coal out of that mining facility.  This was back some decades ago.  The R of W up into Gray can still be found if one has knowledge where to look.  I have seen WM engines up in there pulling out loads of coal to take back to Rockwood and to the main line.

Edit:  Above quote came up as "RWM", but believe it was Paul's....

[Railway Man]

diningcar

Numbers - Numbers!  It is nice to have methods and formulas which provide satisfaction that we are about to do the right thing. But the source of and reliability of the basic assumption numbers which are applied to the methods and formulas is where the great potential for erronious results lie. This is especially true when applied to line changes or major yard construction projects after the RR has established itself as a viable enterprise. It was not so apparent in the 19th century  when RR's were built into yet undeveloped locales.

With the initial RR construction to locations where no RR existed the potential was perhaps more speculation than science. Thus encentives such as Land Grants were offered as an ingrediant to ROI. And the abandonment of entire RR's or branch lines constructed in the 19th century is indicative of assumptions or speculations which proved erronious. ROI could be computed in the 19th century but assumption numbers were very speculative. IRR (internal rate of return)  was measured with alternatives in another business or the stock and bond market, if indeed IRR was even considered by other than the very astute investors.

Todays RR's must use IRR to compare projects which compete for investment funds and the "savings" or "additional revenue" numbers must be checked by a "post audit" to ascertain how the results compare to the assumptions. A prime example of a failed investment (and in fairness not a bad assumption which could be foreseen) was the Santa Fe's investments in the 1970's at Oklahoma City which enabled it to exclusively serve a new General Motors assembly plant that is closed and will not reopen. Savings which justify expenditure are a principal source of error (or manipulation by those wanting their project approved). Post audits are necessary to find that, for example, the reduction of two swich engine assignments, or any other saving actually occurred.

Also, IRR evaluates the "time value" of the assumption numbers. Thus a saving of $100,000.00 per year today is, if continuous, worth perhaps $5000.00 per year in 15 years dependant upon the interest rate assumed. It is a complicated scene competing for investment dollars and it appears to me that today's major RR's are very astute with their choices.

 

I couldn't more agree with your analysis, insights, and conclusion.  I would add only - and curious to see how you respond -- that as the business model of railroading became better developed it is not unreasonable to increase one's expectations of due diligence by the promoters.  It's one thing to poorly locate a line in 1860 when little is known about the traffic potential and the political stability of the nation is sketchy, and another to poorly locate a line in 1903 when the industry has a half-century of experience under its belt and the nation over a century of rule-of-law.  Excusing an illbegotten extension in 1870 is one thing, extending the same excuse to a George Gould in 1903 makes my eyebrows go up.

I like very much your sentence about IRR being considered only by the most astute investors, if even them.  That's a measure that eludes most people even today, a reason why I couldn't fathom investing one cent in real estate during the last ten years -- I couldn't predict where the top was and I didn't want to buy just before it.  I'm a long-term kind of guy whose satisfied with very modest returns.

I had several discussions about strategy at work yesterday where I tried to get them to consider IRR on several alternative investments of our resources.  No luck on getting through, alas.

[Murphy Siding]

diningcar

Numbers - Numbers!  It is nice to have methods and formulas which provide satisfaction that we are about to do the right thing. But the source of and reliability of the basic assumption numbers which are applied to the methods and formulas is where the great potential for erronious results lie. This is especially true when applied to line changes or major yard construction projects after the RR has established itself as a viable enterprise. It was not so apparent in the 19th century  when RR's were built into yet undeveloped locales........

......... A prime example of a failed investment (and in fairness not a bad assumption which could be foreseen) was the Santa Fe's investments in the 1970's at Oklahoma City which enabled it to exclusively serve a new General Motors assembly plant that is closed and will not reopen.

  Isn't it possible, that some of the lines in question were built to exploit a certain market, exploited it, paid for themselves, then withered away?  If the above mentioned ATSF line were to have years and years of investment payback to the owners, before the plant closed, wouldn't it be similar to the economic lifespan of a piece of equipment?  Were it not for the ICC and regulations, wouldn't a lot of grain gathering lines have fit that scenario?

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

RWM, diningcar, & others -

Something else we ought to keep in mind is that railroad lines do not necessarily have to survive forever in order to be commercially successful, much as we might wish for them to do so (as most of us also do for ourselves personally).  It is entirely reasonable and practical to build a line for a known and anticipated limited useful life, with the expectation that all operating expenses will be paid, and that the capital so invested will be completely recovered, together with a commensurate Return On Investment (ROI).  [Note that "profit" is 1 component of that, but a purely economic return or "rental" of the money is another, together with a risk reward, and a few other components that I can't recall just now - and which are beyond the scope of this discussion anyway.]

One example that I think we can all accept are logging railroads and branch lines - we don't view them all as failures just because they were pulled up a few years after being laid, when they'd outlived their economic usefulness.

Another example was a railroad that was built by David Moffat to serve Leadville, Colorado, I believe, just a few months before another competing RR with a much better route got there and essentially put Moffat's line out of business by being able to charge less.  During its brief existence, Moffat's line was able to make enough money to recover its costs.  [I'm writing this from memory - my source is Harold A. Boner's The Moffat Road, and it's at home, not here.  RWM, I recall from prior posts that you're familiar with mining and that area, so you may have a different view of this - I have no knowledge independent of Boner's recounting of it, so I'll understand if you disagree.  But I'll try to provide the specifics in a later post.]

Accordingly, not every line that we're discussing here may be a failure.  As RWM has requested for the Lackawanna Cut-Offs, we ought to look at the figures - if available - for each such line, before judging its promoters and engineers too harshly.  On the other hand, yeah, some of them deserve it - "We don't need no stinkin' numbers*" to confirm that !

- Paul North.

* - Adapted from the movie Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, if I recall correctly.

[Railway Man]

Paul_D_North_Jr

RWM, diningcar, & others -

Something else we ought to keep in mind is that railroad lines do not necessarily have to survive forever in order to be commercially successful, much as we might wish for them to do so (as most of us also do for ourselves personally).  It is entirely reasonable and practical to build a line for a known and anticipated limited useful life, with the expectation that all operating expenses will be paid, and that the capital so invested will be completely recovered, together with a commensurate Return On Investment (ROI).  [Note that "profit" is 1 component of that, but a purely economic return or "rental" of the money is another, together with a risk reward, and a few other components that I can't recall just now - and which are beyond the scope of this discussion anyway.]

One example that I think we can all accept are logging railroads and branch lines - we don't view them all as failures just because they were pulled up a few years after being laid, when they'd outlived their economic usefulness.

Another example was a railroad that was built by David Moffat to serve Leadville, Colorado, I believe, just a few months before another competing RR with a much better route got there and essentially put Moffat's line out of business by being able to charge less.  During its brief existence, Moffat's line was able to make enough money to recover its costs.  [I'm writing this from memory - my source is Harold A. Boner's The Moffat Road, and it's at home, not here.  RWM, I recall from prior posts that you're familiar with mining and that area, so you may have a different view of this - I have no knowledge independent of Boner's recounting of it, so I'll understand if you disagree.  But I'll try to provide the specifics in a later post.]

Accordingly, not every line that we're discussing here may be a failure.  As RWM has requested for the Lackawanna Cut-Offs, we ought to look at the figures - if available - for each such line, before judging its promoters and engineers too harshly.  On the other hand, yeah, some of them deserve it - "We don't need no stinkin' numbers*" to confirm that !

- Paul North.

* - Adapted from the movie Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, if I recall correctly.

 

Paul -- My earlier example of a logging railway is precisely what you're talking about for a temporary railway facility.  All Wellington was arguing for is, "please, this is about money, not about curve geometry and big bridges, and by applying those lessons assiduously we perform a greater social good than just enriching ourselves at the expense of others."

The example of David Moffat is Cripple Creek, Colorado, but while Boner was correct in that there is a business case for a low-cost-of-construction, short-term, high-profit railroad to a cost-no-object traffic source, he misapplied it to Cripple Creek and apparently had only a dim idea of Moffat's business methods.  David Moffat was a shrewd investor of regional significance who made a great deal of money trafficking in the greed and ignorance of others, and was not ethically challenged by things such as jury tampering.  See the book "A Mine to Make a Mine, Financing the Colorado Mining Industry, 1859-1902" by Joseph E. Smith.

RWM

[diningcar]

Railway Man

diningcar

Numbers - Numbers!  It is nice to have methods and formulas which provide satisfaction that we are about to do the right thing. But the source of and reliability of the basic assumption numbers which are applied to the methods and formulas is where the great potential for erronious results lie. This is especially true when applied to line changes or major yard construction projects after the RR has established itself as a viable enterprise. It was not so apparent in the 19th century  when RR's were built into yet undeveloped locales.

With the initial RR construction to locations where no RR existed the potential was perhaps more speculation than science. Thus encentives such as Land Grants were offered as an ingrediant to ROI. And the abandonment of entire RR's or branch lines constructed in the 19th century is indicative of assumptions or speculations which proved erronious. ROI could be computed in the 19th century but assumption numbers were very speculative. IRR (internal rate of return)  was measured with alternatives in another business or the stock and bond market, if indeed IRR was even considered by other than the very astute investors.

Todays RR's must use IRR to compare projects which compete for investment funds and the "savings" or "additional revenue" numbers must be checked by a "post audit" to ascertain how the results compare to the assumptions. A prime example of a failed investment (and in fairness not a bad assumption which could be foreseen) was the Santa Fe's investments in the 1970's at Oklahoma City which enabled it to exclusively serve a new General Motors assembly plant that is closed and will not reopen. Savings which justify expenditure are a principal source of error (or manipulation by those wanting their project approved). Post audits are necessary to find that, for example, the reduction of two swich engine assignments, or any other saving actually occurred.

Also, IRR evaluates the "time value" of the assumption numbers. Thus a saving of $100,000.00 per year today is, if continuous, worth perhaps $5000.00 per year in 15 years dependant upon the interest rate assumed. It is a complicated scene competing for investment dollars and it appears to me that today's major RR's are very astute with their choices.

 

I couldn't more agree with your analysis, insights, and conclusion.  I would add only - and curious to see how you respond -- that as the business model of railroading became better developed it is not unreasonable to increase one's expectations of due diligence by the promoters.  It's one thing to poorly locate a line in 1860 when little is known about the traffic potential and the political stability of the nation is sketchy, and another to poorly locate a line in 1903 when the industry has a half-century of experience under its belt and the nation over a century of rule-of-law.  Excusing an illbegotten extension in 1870 is one thing, extending the same excuse to a George Gould in 1903 makes my eyebrows go up.

I like very much your sentence about IRR being considered only by the most astute investors, if even them.  That's a measure that eludes most people even today, a reason why I couldn't fathom investing one cent in real estate during the last ten years -- I couldn't predict where the top was and I didn't want to buy just before it.  I'm a long-term kind of guy whose satisfied with very modest returns.

I had several discussions about strategy at work yesterday where I tried to get them to consider IRR on several alternative investments of our resources.  No luck on getting through, alas.

RWM, To follow-on with a response about decisions made after a RR was an established entity:

My incomplete analysis is two-fold;

1.Many, perhaps most, RR executives in the 20th century (up to the late 80's) were not that astute. Many having risen through the ranks were not inclined to hire those with an understaning of investment principals because "we are successful and have always done it that way". And to be fair, investment bankers and Wall Street analyists did not recognize this weakness and pressure them to "become modern". Also, ICC regulation provided a crutch upon which to lean, which is another story to complex to address here.. The Staggers Act made them compete in the marketplace and by the late 1980's they began to become serious about marketing their business and making better investment decisions.

2. Many good investment decisions were made in the 20th century. Some were lucky as their value became apparent with the changing of our complex economy, ie., Santa Fe's decision to construct, in 1937, 235 miles of new track between Amarillo, TX and Las Animas Jct. This line had little business until coal became a major transportation commodity. It is now the major BNSF route for loaded coal trains to Texas because of its favorable grades and shorter distance.

A wise and apparently well analized project which does not fit into the "luck" catagory was Santa Fe's decision made shortly after 1900 to build the Belen Cutoff which is now the center of BNSF's Transcon. Santa Fe had as their access to California's development their line from Chicago through Kansas City, La Junta and Albuquerque which had both Raton and Glotieta Passes on it. Santa Fe had built south into Oklahoma and Texas from Kansas and were obviously unable to compete with the SP for California traffic and so President Ripley started this 275 mile new rail line, which because of financing difficulties took ten years to complete. It immediately began to function as intended.

As I initially said, very incomplete, but perhaps some perspective.

 

 

[Falcon48]

In looking back at rail expansion projects which, from the perspective of 2009, seem to have been poorly considered, one has to distingush between projects where the promoters should have known better, and projects which seemed justifiable based on what the promoters knew or could reasonably anticipate at the time, but ultimately proved otherwise.  Certainly, some of the investments in new rail facilities in the late 19th and early 20th century had all of the trappings of speculative "bubbles" which, as bubbles are wont to do, ultimately burst. And it wasn't only the steam railroads.  Much of the investment in interuruban electric railroads would also fall into this category. 

However, even the most conservative railroad investor around the turn of the last century could not have reasonably foreseen the explosive development in highway transportation which was to come and completely alter the face of railroading.   An investor at that time could have reasonably assumed that railroads would continue indefinitely to be the country's primary transportation infrastructure, and that both rail freight and passenger traffic would continue to grow by leaps and bounds as the nation grew.  Seen in this light, many (but not all) of the investments in additional main lines that now seem foolish may have seemed reasonable and prudent.  Investments in branch lines would also have seemed reasonable in a pre-highway era when branch line networks were important sources of traffic. 

Numbers are great but, as someone else said, numbers are only as good as the assumptions behind them.  If the underlying assumptions prove wrong, the numbers aren't worth the paper they're written on.  Unfortunately, it's hard to predict the future, particularly over the life of a long-lived investment like a railroad.  And it's not only railroads.  Look, for example, at the major newspapers like the Chicago Tribune (now bankrupt) that made big investments in new printing plants just as the internet era was about to burst upon them. 

[selector]

Bucyrus

henry6

The problem is not democracy but human behavior.

What's wrong with human behavior?

 

The answer is that humans are notoriously, even pathologically, unpredictable.  Even though there is a lot of wisdom in the aphorism, "The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour" in the world of Industrial/Organizational Psychology, a large part of my own background, the fact is that behaviour is most affected by context, and context is heavily influenced by concurrent and immediate problems, or what are perceived to be problems.

Translated, what a person says they will do (future), and what they actually end up doing, are far too often linked only by the wilful duplicity inherent in lying.  The lie will sometimes be done with full intention to lie at the time of promising, or it will become the lie when the person elects to do what they had promised not to do when the times comes to fulfill the promise.  Think politicians.  Some of them actually do intend to do what they say they will do, but a confluence of events and pressures at the time of fulfillment makes them take a more 'pragmatic' approach...and do the opposite.

A case in point: Liberal government in British Columbia, with its hefty majority and popularity, shoved near-sighted legislation through a couple of years back forbidding the Government from having defecit budgets....ever again.  Our Premier is about to recall the Legislature to suspend that law.  Go figure!

-Crandell