if Penn Central never happened....

If the Pennsylvania had not merged with the NYC they would gone bankrupt. The ICC would have carved them up giving the viable sections to other railroads and abandoning the rest.

Which is eventually what happened. Look at the PRR main west of Alliance Ohio as just one example.  Of course it happen to a lot of other railroads as well.

Here's how I see it playing out.

PRR and N&W announce a merger.  Because of Pennsy's footprint in the mid-west P&WV, Wabash and NKP would not have been included in the mix.  In response Chessie reconsiders and agrees to a merger with C&O.  Since the Chessie-C&O combination includes a line to Boston the PRR-N&W agrees to take on New Haven.  This then leaves a number of lines, Erie Lackawanna, Lehigh Valley, CNJ, Reading, P&WV, NKP and Wabash that probably get folded into two systems with the Chessie-C&O getting trackage rights between Philadelphia and NYC, possibly in return for the system containing Reading/CNJ getting trackage rights into Pot Yard.

Initially I don't see this round of mergers being a problem for the newly forming SCL/Family Lines.  It might spur Southern into being more aggressive in seeking a merger partner.  The original Norfolk Southern probably would not be allowed to join the PRR-N&W group, but probably would have still benefitted from it.

@Bill N posted:

Here's how I see it playing out.

PRR and N&W announce a merger.  Because of Pennsy's footprint in the mid-west P&WV, Wabash and NKP would not have been included in the mix.  In response Chessie reconsiders and agrees to a merger with C&O.  Since the Chessie-C&O combination includes a line to Boston the PRR-N&W agrees to take on New Haven.  This then leaves a number of lines, Erie Lackawanna, Lehigh Valley, CNJ, Reading, P&WV, NKP and Wabash that probably get folded into two systems with the Chessie-C&O getting trackage rights between Philadelphia and NYC, possibly in return for the system containing Reading/CNJ getting trackage rights into Pot Yard.

Initially I don't see this round of mergers being a problem for the newly forming SCL/Family Lines.  It might spur Southern into being more aggressive in seeking a merger partner.  The original Norfolk Southern probably would not be allowed to join the PRR-N&W group, but probably would have still benefitted from it.

interesting theory

if this had happened would there have been more class ones of the 21st century than what we actually have?

@paigetrain posted:

and the Pennsy merged with the Norfolk and Western would they still be around? would it be called Pennsylvania and Western and after the southern merger Pennsylvania southern?

what if the Southern had also merged with the Missouri Pacific when it merged with the combined Pennsy -N&W and the Mo-pac  also got the santa fe- The Missouri Southern and Santa Fe - MSSF? + Pennsylvania and Western- Pennsylvania Southern and Santa Fe- PSSF?

looks to me like a cool what if modeling opportunity AND i've heard that some of these mergers were actually planned but were abandoned for one reason or another.

thoughts?

if the Penn Central was not formed, you would’ve had a massive bankruptcy in East Coast RailroadIng. it probably would’ve dragged multiple other railroads with it and it would’ve crippled passenger services as well.

craig

PennCentralShops

Chessie merge with C&O? I wonder if you meant B&O, which merged with C&O ("the Chessie") to form the Chessie System? Also I believe by 1968 the old Norfolk Southern regional / shortline had already been bought by the Southern?

The issue that is hard to know now is how other railroads would have reacted. Would Southern try to block the Pennsy-N&W merger, or demand some concessions like trackage rights etc.? NP had some working agreements with NYC, CB&Q had a run-through agreement from Chicago to the Twin Cities with NYC. So might the BN merger have included NYC in response?

Always fun to speculate.

I highly doubt we would have a larger number of Railroads though. It would just be a different mix of corporate mergers creating about the same thing we have.

I feel that no matter what happened, only a few railroad conglomerates would exist in the end.

Keep the Rock Island in mind. This is in the era when the ICC sat on their proposed merger with the UP for 11 years and drove them into bankruptcy. Most of the Rock Island was torn up.  

There were many studies made by the ICC with multiple groupings to consolidate and keep the railroads out of bankruptcy, I've read them in multiple books just cant tell you which ones.

The old Norfolk Southern was constantly in bad shape but stayed independent until Jan 1 1974 when acquired by the Southern.  NS would have eventually gone away anyway but I read in some book that the PC bankruptcy basically killed them as NS was owed money for Delmarva interchange cars which was substantial at that time and that money was immediately frozen since NS was considered a creditor, yet NS had to keep paying PC.  Cash out, no cash in.  Had to have hurt other connecting roads in the same manner

@David Johnston posted:

Keep the Rock Island in mind. This is in the era when the ICC sat on their proposed merger with the UP for 11 years and drove them into bankruptcy. Most of the Rock Island was torn up.  

Most of the Rock Island main lines were sold off, and NOT "torn up".

Craig: Whether Penn Central happens there is still going to be an overabundance of lines serving the northeast and midwest.  The de-industrialization in that area is still going to happen.  Agnes is still going to wreak havoc and the oil crisis is still going to hit.  So to that extent I agree.  Plus without Penn Central's collapse it is possible some of the regulatory and tax changes that helped revive Conrail, and aided other lines, would not have happened.  However I think the larger N&W shows that it would have been possible to combine certain roads in the northeast-midwest into a financially viable system.

Stix:  Sorry, typing error.  I meant Chessie-NYC.  IIRC the discussions on the PRR-NYC merger started in the late 1950s, while Southern did not take over the original Norfolk Southern until the early 1970s.  If we assume no Penn Central that opens up the possibility of alternative combinations happening in the 1950s or early 1960s, before Southern took over the original Norfolk Southern.

Don:  I agree.  However the map would probably have ended up much different, with true U.S. transcontinentals likely.  It does not require a significant historical rewrite to have Burlington Northern trains showing up in Savannah Georgia even with Penn Central.

David:  I believe regulatory hurdles delayed the Penn Central merger.  Makes me  wonder how the SCL merger was pulled off.

@NHVRYGray posted:

There were many studies made by the ICC with multiple groupings to consolidate and keep the railroads out of bankruptcy, I've read them in multiple books just cant tell you which ones.

The old Norfolk Southern was constantly in bad shape but stayed independent until Jan 1 1974 when acquired by the Southern.  NS would have eventually gone away anyway but I read in some book that the PC bankruptcy basically killed them as NS was owed money for Delmarva interchange cars which was substantial at that time and that money was immediately frozen since NS was considered a creditor, yet NS had to keep paying PC.  Cash out, no cash in.  Had to have hurt other connecting roads in the same manner

I have a book about the original Norfolk Southern (my favorite railroad) and it talks about how the Penn Central had a nasty effect on the original NS.

The Rock Island bankruptcy / failure oddly enough lead to the end of the railroad that ran through my home town, the Minneapolis Northfield and Southern. The Soo Line was so sure they were going to get the Rock's Twin City - Kansas City "spine line" that in 1982 they bought the MN&S as it connected with the Soo Line in north Minneapolis and the Rock's mainline south of the Twin Cities.

Of course, the spine line went to C&NW instead, and eventually the Soo/CP leased much of the old MN&S to Progressive Rail...who operate it with some former MN&S engines, wearing a close variation of the old MN&S paint scheme.

Two factors come into play that Penn Central had a direct effect upon.

1. Passenger rail was not profitable and overly regulated as to what routes were mandated by the federal government.  Amtrak took the burden of money losing passenger rail off the shoulders of the railroads and at the same time reduced the network of passenger routes to a more sustainable, if not profitable level.
2. When the federal government got in the business of operating a freight railroad there was a further realization that many regulations were not conducive to a sustainable business model.  Conrail led directly to the Staggers Act and for the most part railroads became much healthier as a whole. 

Speaking as a hobbyist and not as a businessperson or a railroader, I find Penn Central to be a fascinating road simply for the variety of outdated equipment that traversed the system.  I have the benefit of only being 7 when Conrail was formed so I don't have the personal memories of what a disaster PC was.  I did ride on it once prior to Conrail, but I just remember the GG1 and that was an amazing memory that sticks with me to this day.

One of the many trains I'm piecing together is a PC era Broadway Limited.  It's a bit freelance as I'm relying a lot on former NYC stainless cars, but I enjoy looking at photos of this brief era of time when anything and everything could be found behind a set of E units or a GG1.

PC was the catalyst for much needed change on the regulatory side of railroading and to that end it served its purpose.   

The Staggers Rail Act in 1980, did that allow Conrail to rip up tracks that were no longer useful in order to avoid paying taxes on them? Conrail abandoned a bunch of tracks in my area and some were sold off to short lines, others ripped up, and others left to sit and rot until they were eventually ripped up. Now most of the Conrail tracks in my area are NS.

I remember reading the Wall Street Journal book, "Riding the Pennsy to Ruin." I can't remember if it was The Pennsy, NYC or the then newly formed Penn Central (most likely them), but one of them was hemoragging money so badly that they could not afford to buy all the red pens for their reports, to show all the "red ink" that they were in!

Looking back, the PC merger turned out to be a necessary bandaid to keep things rolling (literally) until a better plan emerged, luckily later Conrail.

The PC was the first railroad I was old enough able to follow as a youngster.

Tom

The problem with the Pennsylvania was it had to much infrastructure west of Pittsburgh.  Multiple tracks where 1 or 2 would do and had all those large yards. The PRR was taxed on everything and they used big and heavy steam until 1955 and steam until 57 in Jersey. They were very conservative in their approach to railroading.

I did not see it mentioned above; find a book called THE WRECK OF THE PENN CENTRAL, by Joseph R. Daughen. & Peter Binzen. It goes into great detail about the merger and some results. And is an interesting read.

And the PRR had the most surviving steam locomotives of the pre-Conrail railroads, most of which are at the Railroad Museum of PA in East Strasburg. They were stored at Northumberland before the state acquired them for the museum, which opened in 1975 across Rt. 741 from the Strasburg Rail Road. The 1361 in Altoona is being restored to run again. NS will even let it use their tracks to get to other railroads and tour the state. It could be a guest at tourist railroads.