Penn Central

>>900897
>What went wrong?
Pennsy and NYC were suffering from the rapid de-industrialization and rapid motorisation in the Northeast which didn't give the best chances to PC.

Still, they would have probably faired a lot better had the financial blunder that was NH not been part of the merger.

>>900902
Why was New Haven so shitty?

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Was there any railroad with a greater variety of motive power than Penn Central?

>ALCos
>FM
>BLW
>GE
>EMD
>freight and passenger electrics

The only railroad that comes close in the variety department is the Milwaukee Road.

This is such a well documented boondoggle that it's kind of pointless to ask /n/.

But basically, two struggling north east railroads with largely parrallel routes merged and then sucked a fat one when they couldn't cut costs fast enough nor compete with the booming trucking industry.

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>>900954
Would they have done any better through the 1970s if they were still independent lines?

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>ywn ride this

>>900961
Anything is possible. The PRR was such a huge company and actually had some profitable segments, but overregulation and competition from trucking was difficult. That and a very dense network with unneeded rail would have made avoiding bankruptcy difficult, but restructring instead of liquidation would have been more likely.

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>>900965
True, the inability to abandon excess or redundant trackage really screwed Penn Central and its predecessors. One reason Conrail was able to eventually turn a profit was that they were able to abandon thousands of miles of track after deregulation via the Staggers Act.

Have a Penn Central tugboat.

>>900968
Yeah, people will sometimes try to blame the downfall of the PC on unions and crew sizes inefficiency and all that, but it's nonsense. Yeah, you didn't need a fireman on a diesel engine, but what killed you was the inability to abandon 20 miles of rail to an industry that got 1 box car every two weeks.

>>900969
Not to mention every track that was in place was subject to full property taxes and assessments by local and state governments.

Unions were the least of Penn Central's many problems. The inept and corrupt leadership was probably the biggest factor in the road's catastrophic failure, though.

>>900961
Maybe. The NYC and PRR both had implemented radical modernisation programs prior to the merger (if I'm not mistaken the NYC was the first major railroad to implement CTC) so it's obvious that both companies still had capital and were willing to restructure.
Both railroads might have survived a lot longer had a deregulation bill had passed in the same period the IHA had been passed.

>>900963
What line is that?

>>900968
is that a picture of the New Jersey-Brooklyn tugs?

>>900971
CTC is actually a pretty old technology. It was rolled out in the 1930s.

But yeah, PRR and NYC both were trying to modernize. PRR saw the future in pig traffic and created the TTX company which is still around today.

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>>900971
The railpictures data says Scarborough, NY, 1971.

>>900972
Yeah.

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Metroliner ad 1/2

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>>900976
2/2

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>>900976
>>900977

>>900976
>>900977
>>900979
Damn that looks good, I want to go on it.

>>900906
Dunno. It tried to pimp itself up when the wife of the president put new graphics on the NH and Boston and Maine trains. Not much difference.

>>901072
Them locomotives snuggling up so comfy.

>>901067
dig the fl-9 but that yellow MoW(?) car with the lights on top looks interesting too.

If they had put the money that hey were taking from the railroad, back into the railroad instead of everything else. I believe that they could have done as well as Conrail. Read "No way to run a railroad " and "The men who loved trains" . Both break it down.

>>901883
Conrail only started making a profit after they were allowed to abandon thousands of miles of unprofitable lines.

>>901067
Nice Hancock whistle!

>>904230
lol i always thought that was a receiver for cab signals or something

>>900998
The M8 trains that run on Metro North are pretty much modern Metroliners from my experience

>>900897
read "The Men Who Loved Trains"

It is a book talking about all of the stock failures, fed regulations, and corporation mismanagement that led to the fall of the PC, PRR, NYC, NH, and E&LW. Also goes into detail how they formed Conrail.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEAUFP3bPjU

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I love these ancient looking EMUs, still running in 1971.

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>>921586
Apparently these are MP54s and they ran from 1915 to 1981. Pretty impressive!

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Here's a postcard Penn Central produced. Would make a good banner image somewhere.

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>>901067
Strange paint scheme, wonder why it was used.

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>>901067
>>921748
Apparently these are FL9s, can't tell if they were all painted yellow and blue originally like on the left and then some later faded to white and lighter/gray blue, or if they were painted in 2 different schemes.

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Some nice footage here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNiSjedixa8

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Classic Pennsy

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What's with the handrails on the top of the U25B?

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This is a nice heritage unit.

Penn Island

>>923147
They had a colossus?

>>925608
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trainphone#Antenna

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Some interesting coverage and photos of Hurricane Agnes' impact on Penn Central's lines and operations in 1972.

http://www.unlikelypcrr.com/page3/Welcome_files/PC_POST_1972-08.pdf

>>926086
Kek

>>929741
Is that the storm that bankrupted E-L? Or was it Lehigh Valley?