12-31-2008, 04:58 PM
MM, you're absolutely right...until a fella named "IKE" came along and built the interstate highway system, there wasn't much hauled any distance by truck - trains did it all, for industries large and small - and rails ran everywhere with lots of branches, secondaries and industrial tracks. Then the trucks took a lot of LCL and door-to-door traffic, just as the airplane took much of the mail and time-sensitive shipment. The "service only to 100 carloads a week customers" is a result of route consolidation and intermodal methods. Not that long ago, it just wasn't that way - another reason for me to model earlier times. Bob C
James Thurber - "It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers."