Association of American Railroads ad - March 18, 1939

RAILWAYIST — Sun, 03 May 2009 22:47:19 GMT

"It takes real railroading these days - A fair field-No Government Favor In Transportation"

"You'll have to think twice to name any other kind of transportation that does that job for itself. They tell me that mort than thirty cents out of every dollar the railroads take in goes for maintenance, interest, taxes and other costs due to the fact that the railroads do build and maintain their own roadways--and that more than half of the total railroad investment is in the roadway. If other kinds of transportation that use -"WAYS" - built and maintained by the public had to pay the full cost of building and maintaining the -"WAYS"- they use, they couldn't even come close to furnishing their service for what the railroads charge."

"That goes for the so-called 'cheap transportation' by inland waterways. Almost without exception, the SUBSIDY paid by taxpayers for each ton is as much as, and in most cases more than, the total cost of moving the same freight by rail. The biggest part of the taxes paid by highway carriers goes to building and maintaining the roads they use--and they rell me that studies by a number of state highway departments show that these taxes do not cover the highway carriers- REAL SHARE OF ROAD COSTS. Railraods pay more taxes per dollar of revenue than highway carriers do. And the big point is that railroad taxes are not used for building or maintaining their roadway--they go to meet general expenses of government. "

"That's why I say, 'It takes real railroading these days.' And the railroads are doing a real job. When the railroads haul a ton mile at an average revenue of one cent and pay their own costs, they're doing a job that can't be beat by any other transportation system on the world, bar none. And when they do a job like that--it seems to me that about all they need is a SQUARE DEAL IN TRANSPORTATION." A FAIR FIELD--NO GOVERNMENT FAVOR IN TRANSPORTATION."

So here we are in 2009, the OPEC-OIL fueled auto/truck/air transport system that sabotaged & replaced the US-railway system allowed for the largest transfer of wealth in world history, the auto based suburban sprawl-credit card economic bubble has popped, and what we a left with is a pre-20th century rail system that must stuggle to catch up with the rest of the world. The present demise of Chrysler and General Motors can somewhat be distantly related to the liquidations of the New York Cental System and The Pennsylvania Railroad.

RAIL IS THE NEW TECHNOLOGY!

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Association of American Railroads ad - March 18, 1939