On Monday, April 7, 2014 8:37:00 AM UTC-4, conklin wrote:

> Amtrak DOES need the money.  Freight service used to always subsdize 
> passenger service in the "good old days."

No, passenger service was profitable in its own right in the old days.  "The
Twilight of the Passenger Train" discusses the economics in detail.

If a passenger train wasn't making money, the railroad would discontinue it
(presuming the ICC allowed it).  

At the end of WW II, the railroads felt confident enough in the future of
passenger service that they invested millions of stockholder dollars in the
purchase of new passenger equipment.  Some railroads kept buying equipment
into the 1960s.  They would 
not have invested in something that lost money.

Obviously, conditions varied by territory and time frame.  Mid western and
western roads did better than eastern roads.

--- SoupGate/W32 v1.03
 * Origin: LiveWire BBS -=*=- UseNet FTN Gateway (1:2320/1)