MAIN LINES: REBIRTH OF THE NORTH AMERICAN RAILROADS, 1970-2002 (Railroads in America) [Hardcover]

Richard Saunders Jr. (Author)

Book Description

Series: Railroads in America | Publication Date: October 9, 2003

Rising from the corporate wreckage of the 1970s, when even the nation's largest railroad filed for bankruptcy, American railroads are once again a major part of the global economy. Richard Saunders brings to life this amazing story of revitalization, showing how a combination of creatively structured aid from the public sector and talented private management gave railroads new momentum. By 2002, American railroads carried five times the tonnage they hauled in their former heyday, and they did this with one-tenth of the employees.

How did this revolution happen? Saunders shows how limited, disciplined, and politically risky government intervention stabilized a sinking industry. Whatever their results for other industries, President Carter's deregulation and President Reagan's tax revisions restored the railroads' financial health. Container cars and other new technologies also helped to transform inefficient railroads into vibrant enterprises. Corporate strategies varied on the road to success, and even skilled managers encountered pitfalls, but the railroads' resurgence and growth proved to be unstoppable.

After the merger mania of the mid-twentieth century, the main U.S. railroad systems evolved into seven transregional corporate giants. Of the "Super Seven," only four survived past the 1990s—the Norfolk Southern, CSX, Union Pacific, and Burlington Northern–Santa Fe. These four set the standard at a time when no other major railroads could afford the new technologies needed to turn a profit.

A sequel to Merging Lines, this engagingly written account brings the story of American railroads up to the twenty-first century. As American transport enters the twenty-first century, the iron horse that consolidated the Industrial Revolution once again flexes its muscle.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Magisterial in scope and precise in detail, Main Lines makes a significant contribution to modern railroad history and to the history of American business."
—Mark Reutter, Editor, Railroad History

"A superb source of recent US railroad history and a must read for anyone with an interest in the re-birth of the North American railroad industry."—Michigan Railfan

"An extraordinarily detailed and insightful look at the complex and profound reconfiguration of American railroads ... this work is likely to remain the standard account of how the modern rail system came into being for some time to come."—Indiana Magazine of History

About the Author

Richard Saunders Jr. teaches history at Clemson University. He is author of Merging Lines: American Railroads, 1900-1970, which won the 2002 George W. and Constance M. Hilton Award.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 457 pages
• Publisher: Northern Illinois University Press; 1 edition (October 9, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0875803164
• ISBN-13: 978-0875803166
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.2 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #903,908 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great book., February 4, 2004

By 

J. Pagliero (Carmichael, California United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: MAIN LINES: REBIRTH OF THE NORTH AMERICAN RAILROADS, 1970-2002 (Railroads in America) (Hardcover)

This book carries on the very fine writing from this author's previous work, Merging Lines. This is an exceptionally good history of railroads in America since 1970. It explains why we see which railroad companies are still operating and what happened to the likes of Southern Pacific, Western Pacific, Conrail, Southern, Rio Grande, etc. It is a very easy read and hard to put down. I look forward to the next book from this author.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Definitive History of US Railroads in the Modern Era, May 4, 2004

By 

Henry Posner III (Pittsburgh, PA USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: MAIN LINES: REBIRTH OF THE NORTH AMERICAN RAILROADS, 1970-2002 (Railroads in America) (Hardcover)

Drawing from numerous sources, Saunders weaves the economic and political history behind Railroading As We Know It Today into a work that is all at once comprehensive, insightful and engaging. This is no less than the Definitive Work and I have been recommending it as such to colleagues.

Having been with the Rock Island and Conrail for much of the time period covered, I can also attest that he seems to have gotten the facts not only right, but also in perspective.

Henry Posner III

Chairman
Railroad Development Corp.
Pittsburgh, PA

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Indispensable, October 6, 2011

By 

Allen Smalling "Constant Reader," (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: MAIN LINES: REBIRTH OF THE NORTH AMERICAN RAILROADS, 1970-2002 (Railroads in America) (Hardcover)

MAIN LINES is the indispensable history to find out why the United States went from dozens of "Class One" railroads in 1970, with most of the ones in the northeastern U.S. bankrupt or heading toward it, to today's situation with only seven Class One railroads, six of them megasystems (two of them Canadian-owned), only the smallest just a good-sized road but not a "mega" (the Kansas City Southern). Not all active track is operated by those seven roads, but pretty much by default the smaller lines are called "short lines," and frequently one operator will work a bunch of little segments that are separated by Class Ones.

In the Sixties, a combination of improving non-rail infrastructure, railroad corporate stodginess, federal inaction and some outright looting brought American railroads to the brink. In general, the industry was in much worse shape than most people (even railroad analysts) knew. That Sixties had seen the new subsidized interstate highways and the new medium-distance jets taking away first a lot of trucking, then intercity passenger travel from the rails. Most railroad companies were disinclined to seek subsidies to keep their passenger services going. Very strict tariff legislation dating back to the Trust-busting era had stifled innovation. Even worse, one the most respected and well-known railroads, the Pennsylvania Railroad or "Pennsy," had been looted Enron-style, malfeasance that went unecognized well into the PRR-New York Central merger as "Penn Central," which itself lasted only about two years.

By the early Seventies, "the experts" were predicting that in a few years American railroading would be reduced to export-coal trains coming out of the Appalachians, commuter services, a handful of inter-city links like New York to Washington, D.C., and not much else. What went right? This book is an excellent way, perhaps the best way, for the lay reader to understand the pain and consolidation of the 1970s (which gave us both Amtrak and Conrail), and how that winnowing down laid the framework for the regulatory reforms of the 1980s.

Compared to 1980, today's railroads are hauling about a quarter more freight with just over half the employees and about a third fewer track miles. The Interstate Commerce Commission was gradually phased out in favor of the more marketed-oriented Surface Transportation Board (nickname: the "Surf Board"). Railroads became more free to seek out new shippers, one of the major beneficiaries being the nascent Intermodal movement (shipping containers and trailers, mostly) and revolutionary overhauls in telecommunication, signalling and computerized sorting of cars. Also in the Eighties, (yet another) wave of mergermania took hold, not to be resolved until the late 1990s, when the country emerged with its current Big Seven (and as the joke goes, number seven doesn't count).

An excellent companion to this volume, in fact the perfect lead-in, is MERGING LINES, author Saunders' history of U.S. railroading from 1900 to 1970. We come to understand how American railroading has almost always been dominated by "mergermania," with hundreds of rail companies at the turn of the 20th Century winnowing down to a few dozen by 1970. Another book that finds great favor with business as well a railroad devotees is THE MEN WHO LOVED TRAINS by Rush Loving, which is more personality-oriented and arguably a bit easier to read. But to me MERGING and MAIN LINES are the definitive histories, with their excellent research and historical grounding, multiplicity of timely maps, and other helpfulness. If anything is missing, it's the more successful railroad companies like the former Santa Fe (ATSF) with their relative lack of drama that kept them out of the corporate-history pages.