Interesting, but un-modeled industries

[Brakie]

One thing for all modern day modelers to watch...Track side industries with no rail service. The major railroads are very reluctant to put switches in off of the main so if the industry does not receive a lot of cars they will be encouraged to use trucks and intermodal.
In my town alone there were 12 business places served by rail when Conrail was formed. Now there are none. To be fair most of the business closed but some have survived without rail service.
Some were forced to close because they no longer could get goods by rail. IMHO The railroads abandoned their way to prosperity and in many cases it was premature. Many abandoned lines could have been utilized for passenger service.
Charlie

Several of the class 1s and the majority of the short lines is seeking the smaller shippers..
There is a lot of myths to today's railroads not wanting growth.

On the other hand many shippers left the rails in favor of trucks-due to poor service of the 50-60s.PC lost more shippers to trucks then any railroad during the time they was in exsistance.

As far as passenger trains..Cars,buses,planes and poor scheduling killed the passenger train.