RE: (erielack) Conroversial Subject?

["Tupaczewski, Paul R \(Paul\)" <paultup_@_alcatel-lucent.com>]

Walt Smith wrote:

>      Of all people, the listers and others in the RR business 
> should be aware of what happens when technology changes. Look 
> what happened to the stagecoaches and wagon haulers when the 
> Rrs came along.......the men adapted to new jobs (as 
> brakemen, firemen, operators, etc.) I've read articles like 
> you saw, Rick and I know how those old wagoneers 
> felt.........An official at Union Station (DC) who'd been on 
> the EL at Hoboken said to me "Well, Walt, you've managed to 
> survive" - he meant on the railroad of course. AMERICAN 
> HERITAGE had a well thought out article a few years ago on 
> the effect of railroads on life in the early 1800s. It 
> mentioned how, in the north especially, people were bound to 
> their local farms and settlements with the advent of winter. 
> When the railroads came, there was, for the first time, a 
> year-round transportation system. It was a MASSIVE change for 
> society.

Major paradigm shifts always wreak havoc. The problem is that most of
the RR executives didn't see that shift coming, and weren't able to jump
on "the next curve", so to speak (i.e., be able to adjust to and embrace
the shift)

The handwriting was already on the wall for local business in EL years,
and the EL's management at least tried to shift to piggyback, which
demonstrates SOME "out of the box" thinking on their part.

Today's railroads have to adjust to even greater paradigm shifts. The US
has very firmly become an "information society" now, no longer an
"industrial society." And that shift can clearly be seen in today's
railroads: The vast majority of today's trains are made up of covered
hoppers and tank cars - which carry the materials to create a high-tech
society (plastics, chemicals used in production of circuit boards, etc.)



> Nowadays in the rustbelt, there is a similar 
> change..........the remnants of the EL no longer haul coal & 
> iron ore, but they ARE still essential unless we want to pave 
> over the entire country.  I truly believe we will see the 
> cutoff restored with psgr service to Scranton & the Southern 
> Tier as well as Syracuse when the politicos get their heads 
> out of their a--es.

And therein lies the problems - restoration of the Cut-Off becomes a
government project, not a private enterprise one. If it was the latter,
it would be done a LOT sooner.

	- Paul

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